fly 

MODERN     HEROINES     SERIES 

EDITED  BY  WARREN  DUNHAM  FOSTER 


HEROINES  OF  THE 
MODERN  STAGE 


MODERN  HEROINES  SERIES 

EDITED  BY  WARREN  DUNHAM  FOSTER 


Now  Ready 

HEROINES    OF    MODERN    PROGRESS 

HEROINES   OF   MODERN    RELIGION 

HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

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SARAH  BKRNHARDT 


HEROINES    OF 
THE    MODERN    STAGE 


BY 
FORREST  IZARD 


ILLUSTRATED 


l^orfc 

STURGIS  &  WALTON 

COMPANY 

1915 

All  right*  reserved 


COPYRIGHT,  1815,  BY 
STURGIS  &  WALTON  COMPANY 


Set  up  and  electrotyped.    Published  November,  1915 


PREFACE 

The  following  pages  give  some  account  of 
those  actresses  who  stand  out  today  as  the  most 
interesting  to  an  English-speaking  reader.  The 
Continental  actresses  included  are  those  who 
gained  international  reputations  and  belonged 
to  the  English  and  American  stage  almost  as 
much  as  to  their  own. 

All  actresses  have  been  modern,  in  a  sense, 
for  the  acting  of  female  roles  by  women  is  dis- 
tinctly a  latter-day  touch  in  that  ancient  insti- 
tution, the  theatre.1  Thus  a  book  on  modern 
actresses  might  range  from  Elizabeth  Barry  to 
Mrs.  Fiske.  But  while  many  volumes  already 
exist  that  serve  well  to  keep  alive  the  names  of 
the  dead-and-gone  heroines,2  biographies  of 
actresses  whom  we  of  today  have  seen,  are,  in 
general,  insufficient  or  inaccessible.  That  is 
true  even  of  such  notable  women  as  Sarah  Bern- 
hardt,  Ada  Eehan  and  Mrs.  Fiske;  while  ac- 
counts in  English  of  such  Continental  actresses 

1  See    Appendix:    The    First    English    Actresses,    and    The 
Change  in  the  Actor's  Social  Status. 

2  For  the  lives  of  actresses  of  earlier  days  the  reader  is  re- 
ferred to  the  bibliography  at  the  end  of  the  volume.     The 


•2261. 


vi  PREFACE 

as  Duse  and  Be  jane  are  altogether  lacking. 
The  author  hopes  that  in  these  chapters  he  has 
done  something  toward  making  better  known 
the  careers  of  those  actresses  and  of  others  who 
present  themselves  either  in  vivid  recollection 
or  in  the  light  of  present  day  achievement. 
The  concluding  chapter  deals  briefly  with  a  num- 
ber of  American  actresses  of  the  present,  who, 
although  not  rising  in  all  cases  to  the  eminence 
or  popularity  attained  by  .those  to  whom  sepa- 
rate chapters  are  given,  yet  have  made  some 
distinct  contribution  to  our  stage. 

The  author's  thanks  are  due  to  Mr.  Edwin 
F.  Edgett  for  the  loan  of  material ;  to  Mr.  John 
Bouve  Clapp  and  to  Mr.  Eobert  Gould  Shaw 
for  the  use  of  the  originals  from  which  some 
of  the  illustrations  were  made;  and,  for  as- 
sistance of  many  kinds,  to  the  editor  of  the 
series. 
Boston,  Massachusetts, 

October,  1915. 

F.  I. 

outstanding  names  are:  Elizabeth  Barry,  1658-1713;  Anne 
Bracegirdle,  1663-1748;  Anne  Oldfield,  1683-1730;  Catherine 
Clive,  1711-1785;  Hannah  Pritchard,  1711-1768;  Susannah 
Maria  Gibber,  1714-1766;  Margaret  Woffington,  1720-1760; 
Mary  Porter  —  d.  1765;  George  Anne  Bellamy,  1731-1788; 
Frances  Abington,  1737-1815;  Sarah  Siddons,  1755-1831; 
Mary  Robinson  ("Perdita")  1758-1800;  Dorothy  Jordan, 
1762-1816;  Frances  Anne  Kemble,  1809-1893;  Charlotte  Gush- 
man,  1816-1876;  Helena  Faucit,  1817-1898;  Rachel  Felix, 


PREFACE  vii 

1821-1858;  Adelaide  Ristori,  1822-1906;  Francesca  Janau- 
scheck,  1830-1904;  Adelaide  Neilson,  1846  (?)-1880. 

Some  of  the  names  in  this  list  are,  of  course,  among  the 
greatest  in  theatrical  history.  In  Anne  Bracegirdle  and 
Elizabeth  Barry  the  Restoration  rejoiced  in  two  actresses  of 
the  first  order.  "Bracey"  was  the  Ada  Rehan  of  her  day,  a 
blithe  creature  of  comedy  who  seems  to  have  possessed  the  tem- 
perament and  the  charms  of  the  typical  born  actress.  Gibber 
called  her  "the  Card,  the  Darling  of  the  Theatre."  She  ex- 
celled in  the  comedies  of  Congreve,  but  she  was  versatile,  and 
played  also  in  tragedy.  Elizabeth  Barry  was  England's  first 
great  tragic  actress.  She  was  of  the  august,  severe,  trage- 
dienne type  that  was  later  exemplified  in  Siddons  and  Ristori, 
and  that  has  nowadays,  with  the  decline  of  the  poetic  drama, 
virtually  disappeared.  With  these  women,  and  with  a  num- 
ber of  others, — some  of  whom,  like  Mrs.  Betterton  and  Mrs. 
Verbruggen,  were  skilled  actresses, — the  standard  was  sur- 
prisingly early  set  high. 

Anne  Oldfield  charmed  the  England  of  Addison  and  Steele 
with  a  versatility  and  brilliance  of  acting  that  has  never  been 
surpassed.  She  acted  with  great  majesty  and  fire  in  the 
tragedies  of  the  day, — such  as  Cato  and  The  Distressed 
Mother, — while  in  comedy  she  "played  with  the  enthusiasm  of 
a  child."  There  is  much  in  the  sunny  amiability,  the  volatile, 
zestful  personality  and  the  wide-ranged  equipment  of  "Nance" 
Oldfield  to  remind  one  of  that  modern  actress, — Ellen  Terry, — 
who  often  herself  impersonated  Mistress  Oldfield. 

One  thinks  again  of  Terry  in  reading  of  Margaret  Woffing- 
ton.  "The  Wofiington"  was  a  beauty,  a  hard  worker,  an 
adept  in  comedy,  and  only  less  successful  in  tragedy.  She 
played  captivatingly  the  rakish  Sir  Harry  Wildair  in  Far- 
quhar's  The  Constant  Couple;  she  was  notably  good  in  parts 
as  diverse  as  Sylvia  in  The  Recruiting  Officer  and  Cordelia  in 
Lear;  but  the  parallel  to  Ellen  Terry  appears  when  we  read 
of  her  lovely  Portia  and  of  her  Rosalind  (a  part  that  Terry 
was  born  to  play,  but  somehow  never  tried).  "Peg"  Wofling- 
ton  was  one  of  that  long  line  of  geniuses  with  whom  Ireland 
has  continued  to  enrich  the  English  theatre,  from  her  day  and 
Sheridan's  down  to  that  of  Ada  Rehan,  Bernard  Shaw  and 
Synge. 

Frances  Abington,  a  person  of  temper  and  caprice,  but  a 
true  daughter  of  comedy  nevertheless;  Dora  Jordan,  who  was 
really  two  Dora  Jordans, — "one  the  whimsical,  hoydenish  per- 
former, all  laughter,  or  the  delineator  of  graceful  sentiment, — 


viii  PREFACE 

the  other,  only  seen  off  the  stage,  a  shrewd  little  woman,  of 
kind  heart  and  exquisite  sensibility";  Mary  Robinson,  the 
"Perdita"  of  him  who  was  to  be  George  IV  of  England,  and 
a  graceful,  appealing  actress  of  the  tenderly  comic  and  of 
such  characters  as  Viola  and  Rosalind — the  Julia  Marlowe  of 
the  eighteenth  century;  such  are  hints  of  a  few  of  those 
women  who  have  continued  the  line  of  gifted  actresses  of 
comedy  and  sentiment  down  from  the  days  of  Bracegirdle  and 
Oldfield. 

For  commanding  figures  in  tragedy,  for  the  Buses  and 
Bernhardts  of  earlier  days,  we  must  look,  as  a  rule,  outside 
of  England  and  America.  There  is,  to  be  sure,  always  Sarah 
Siddons,  a  majestic  figure,  a  veritable  Queen  of  Tragedy,  who 
made  her  characters — such  as  Lady  Macbeth  and  Queen  Kath- 
erine — awe-inspiring  even  to  those  who  acted  with  her.  Her 
niece,  Frances  Ann  Kemble,  was  prevented  from  being  a  truly 
great  actress  only  by  a  dislike  for  the  stage.  As  it  was,  with 
her  Juliet,  her  Belvidera  in  Venice  Preserved,  and  her  Julia 
in  The  Hunchback  she  takes  her  place  in  that  succession  of 
tragic  actresses  which,  with  the  change  in  theatrical  fashions, 
has  now  ceased,  and  which  has  had  its  best  examplars  on  the 
Continent  rather  than  in  England. 

In  Charlotte  Cushman,  America  produced  a  tragic  actress 
of  commanding  dignity  and  power.  She  was  "a  noble  inter- 
preter of  the  noble  minds  of  the  past,"  a  stately  and  vigorous 
woman,  unique  as  Meg  Merrilies,  and  a  powerful  and  poetic 
interpreter  of  Shakespeare's  tragic  women. 

The  daughter  of  a  Jew,  Rachel  Felix  was  a  Parisian  by 
birth,  and  thus  far  she  was  an  earlier  Bernhardt.  In  the 
thrilling  intensity  of  her  acting  and  in  the  capricious  im- 
periousness  of  her  own  nature,  she  again  suggests  Madame 
Sarah.  She  introduced  a  measure  of  naturalness  of  speech 
and  spontaneity  of  action  into  the  French  theatre,  and  here 
her  influence  was  like  that  of  Duse. 

The  rise  of  Adelaide  Ristori  spelled  the  decline  of  the 
great  Rachel.  In  her  earnestness,  in  her  choice  of  plays,  in 
the  quiet  dignity  of  her  life  and  nature,  Ristori  is  recalled 
by  that  later  great  Italian,  Duse.  And  just  as  Duse  invaded 
Paris  and  rivaled  the  reigning  queen  of  the  stage  there,  so 
(only  more  successfully)  did  Ristori  when  she  replaced 
Rachel  in  French  esteem.  Ristori's  parts,  however,  suggest 
rather  Bernhardt,  though  in  general  all  four  actresses — 
Rachel,  Ristori,  Bernhardt  and  Duse — have  worked  in  the 
same  metier.  Ristori's  great  parts  were  Medea,  Franceses, 


PREFACE  ix 

Myrrha,  Lady  Macbeth,  Phe"dre,  Marie  Stuart  and  Queen 
Elizabeth. 

Janauscheck,  "the  last  of  the  actresses  of  the  'grand 
style/ "  born  in  Prague  and  for  years  a  successful  tragedi- 
enne in  Germany,  anticipated  Modjeska  by  her  adoption  of 
America  and  the  English  tongue.  She  too  was  an  heroic 
woman,  who  impressed  her  generation  by  the  intensity  and 
sincerity  of  her  acting,  her  wonderful  voice,  and  the  dignity 
she  lent  her  profession.  Her  best  parts  were  in  Bleak  House, 
Brunnhilde,  Medea  and  Marie  Stuart. 

Adelaide  Neilson,  a  womanly  and  gracious  personality,  an 
ideal  Juliet,  and  a  Shakspearean  actress  who  as  ^iola,  Imo- 
gen and  Rosalind  foreshadowed  and  combined  many  of  the 
merits  of  Modjeska,  Rehan  and  Marlowe,  died  in  the  ripeness 
of  her  youth  and  ability. 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

PREFACE      v 

CHAPTEE 

I    SARAH  BERNHARDT 3 

II    HELENA  MODJESKA 52 

III  ELLEN  TERRY 93 

IV  GABRIELLE  REJANE 126 

V    ELEONORA  DUSE  .     , 171 

VI    ADA  REHAN 203 

VII    MARY  ANDERSON 230 

VIII    MRS.   FISKE 265 

IX    JULIA  MARLOWE        299 

X    MAUDE  ADAMS 324 

XI    SOME  AMERICAN  ACTRESSES  OF  TODAY     .  347 

APPENDIX 368 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 377 

INDEX  .  381 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

SARAH  BERNHARDT Frontispiece 

FACING 
PAGE 

HELENA  MODJESKA 52 

ELLEN  TERRY 92 

GABRIELLE  REJANE 126 

ELEONORA  DUSE 170 

ADA  KEHAN 202 

MARY  ANDERSON 230 

MRS.  FISKE 264 

JULIA  MARLOWE 298 

MAUDE  ADAMS                           324 


HEROINES  OF  THE 
MODERN  STAGE 


HEROINES  OF  THE 
MODERN  STAGE 

SAEAH  BEENHAEDT 

"&ARAH-BERNHARDT,  Officier  d'Acad- 
^  emie,  artiste  dramatique,  directrice  du 
theatre  Sarah-Bernhardt,  professeur  au  Con- 
servatoire;" so  run  the  rapid  phrases  of  the 
French  " Who's  Who."  And,  it  might  have 
added:  " personality  extraordinary,  and  woman 
of  mystery." 

"The  impetuous  feminine  hand  that  wields 
scepter,  thyrsus,  dagger,  fan,  sword,  bauble, 
banner,  sculptor's  chisel  and  horsewhip — it  is 
overwhelming."  Thus  the  poet  Rostand  epito- 
mized ' '  the  divine  Sarah. ' '  Her  career,  he  said, 
gives  one  the  vertigo — it  is  one  of  the  marvels 
of  the  nineteenth  century.  And  he  might  have 
added,  of  the  twentieth,  for  Bernhardt,  who  be- 
gan her  stage  career  at  the  time  of  our  Civil 
War,  was  only  recently,  at  an  amazing  age,  to 
be  seen  on  the  stage  of  London  and  Paris. 
There  are  many  who  think,  with  William  Win- 
ter,1 that  she  has  been  merely  "an  accomplished 

iThe  Wallet  of  Time. 
3 


4        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

executant,  an  experienced,  expert  imitator, 
within  somewhat  narrow  limits,  of  the  opera- 
tions of  human  passion  and  human  suffering." 
The  fact  remains,  the  woman  has  been  a  genius 
of  work  and  achievement,  "the  Lady  of 
Energy,"  who  has  fairly  earned  the  title  of 
great  actress.  It  is  difficult  to  think  of  any 
woman  the  light  of  whose  fame  has  carried  to 
the  ends  of  the  earth  in  quite  the  same  way. 
To  be  sure  it  has  not  always  been  from  the  lamp 
of  pure  genius.  There  have  been  self-advertis- 
ing, scandal,  extravagant  eccentricity,  to  swell 
the  general  effect,  but  back  of  all  this  has  been 
the  worker.2 

2  "All  these  things  that  I  have  known  only  in  the  telling — all 
these  journeys,  these  changing  skies,  these  adoring  hearts,  these 
flowers,  these  jewels,  these  embroideries,  these  millions,  these 
lions,  these  one  hundred  and  twelve  roles,  these  eighty  trunks, 
this  glory,  these  caprices,  these  cheering  crowds  hauling  her 
carriage,  this  crocodile  drinking  champagne — all  these  things, 
I  say,  astonish,  dazzle,  delight,  and  move  me  less  than  some- 
thing else  which  I  have  often  seen:  this — 

"A  brougham  stops  at  a  door;  a  woman,  enveloped  in  furs, 
jumps  out,  threads  her  way  with  a  smile  through  the  crowd 
attracted  by  the  jingling  of  the  bell  on  the  harness,  and 
mounts  a  winding  stair;  plunges  into  a  room  crowded  with 
flowers  and  heated  like  a  hothouse,  throws  her  little  beribboned 
handbag  with  its  apparently  inexhaustible  contents  into  one 
comer,  and  her  bewinged  hat  into  another,  takes  off  her  furs 
and  instantaneously  dwindles  into  a  mere  scabbard  of  white 
silk;  rushes  on  to  a  dimly  lighted  stage  and  immediately  puts 
life  into  a  whole  crowd  of  listless,  yawning,  loitering  folk; 
dashes  forward  and  back,  inspiring  every  one  with  her  own 
feverish  energy;  goes  into  the  prompter's  box,  arranges  her 
scenes,  points  out  the  proper  gesture  and  intonation,  rises  up 
in  wrath  and  insists  on  everything  being  done  over  again; 
shouts  with  fury;  sits  down,  smiles,  drinks  tea  and  begins  to 
rehearse  her  own  part;  draws  tears  from  case-hardened  actors 
who  thrust  their  enraptured  heads  out  of  the  wings  to  watch 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  5 

She  was  born  in  Paris,  at  265  Rue  St.  Ho- 
nore,  October  23,  1844.3  Her  blood  is  a  min- 
gling of  French  and  Dutch-Jewish.  Her  real 
name  is  Eosine  Bernard,  and  she  was  the 
eleventh  of  fourteen  children.  Of  her  father 

her;  returns  to  her  room,  where  the  decorators  are  waiting, 
demolishes  their  plans  and  reconstructs  them;  collapses,  wipes 
her  brow  with  a  lace  handkerchief  and  thinks  of  fainting;  sud- 
denly rushes  up  to  the  fifth  floor,  invades  the  premises  of  the 
astonished  costumier,  rummages  in  the  wardrobes,  makes  up  a 
costume,  pleats  and  adjusts  it;  returns  to  her  room  and  teaches 
the  figurantes  how  to  dress  their  hair;  has  a  piece  read  to  her 
while  she  makes  bouquets;  listens  to  hundreds  of  letters,  weeps 
over  some  tale  of  misfortune,  and  opens  the  inexhaustible  little 
chinking  handbag;  confers  with  an  English  perruquier;  returns 
to  the  stage  to  superintend  the  lighting  of  a  scene,  objurgates 
the  lamps  and  reduces  the  electrician  to  a  state  of  temporary 
insanity;  sees  a  super  who  has  blundered  the  day  before,  re- 
members it,  and  overwhelms  him  with  her  indignation;  returns 
to  her  room  for  dinner ;  sits  down  to  table,  splendidly  pale  with 
fatigue;  ruminates  her  plans;  eats  with  peals  of  Bohemian 
laughter;  has  no  time  to  finish;  dresses  for  the  evening  per- 
formance while  the  manager  reports  from  the  other  side  of  a 
curtain;  acts  with  all  her  heart  and  soul;  discusses  business 
between  the  acts ;  remains  at  the  theatre  after  the  performance, 
and  makes  arrangements  until  three  o'clock  in  the  morning; 
does  not  make  up  her  mind  to  go  until  she  sees  her  staff 
respectfully  endeavoring  to  keep  awake;  gets  into  her  carriage; 
huddles  herself  into  her  furs  and  anticipates  the  delights  of 
lying  down  and  resting  at  last;  bursts  into  laughing  on 
remembering  that  some  one  is  waiting  to  read  her  a  five-act 
play;  returns  home,  listens  to  the  piece,  becomes  excited, 
weeps,  accepts  it,  finds  she  cannot  sleep,  and  takes  advan- 
tage of  the  opportunity  to  study  a  part!  This  is  the  Sarah  I 
have  always  known.  I  never  made  the  acquaintance  of  the 
Sarah  with  the  coffin  and  the  alligators.  The  only  Sarah  1 
know  is  the  one  who  works.  She  is  the  greater." — Edmond 
Rostand,  in  Sarah  Bernhardt,  by  Jules  Huret. 

3  The  correct  date  and  place,  according  to  the  official  record 
of  the  Conservatoire,  The  year  has  sometimes  been  given 
1845.  Some  accounts  have  given  Holland,  others  Havre,  as 
the  birthplace.  Sarah  herself  says  Paris. 


6        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

hardly  anything  can  be  learned.  Sarah  herself 
says  that  when  she  was  still  a  mere  baby  he 
had  gone  to  China,  but  why  he  went  there  she 
had  no  idea.  Her  mother  was,  by  birth,  a 
Dutch  Jewess,  by  sympathy  a  Frenchwoman,  by 
habit  a  cosmopolitan;  "a  wandering  beauty  of 
Israel,"  forever  traveling.  As  much  because 
there  was  no  home,  therefore,  as  because 
the  French  have  a  custom  of  banishing  in- 
fants from  the  household,  Sarah  spent  her 
childhood  in  the  care  of  a  foster-mother,  first  in 
the  Breton  country,  near  Quimperle  (where 
she  fell  in  the  fireplace  and  was  badly  burned), 
then  at  Neuilly,  near  Paris.  Her  mother  came 
seldom  to  see  her,  though  there  seems  to  have 
been  affection,  at  least  on  the  child's  side.  It 
was  a  lonely  childhood — made  worse  by  the 
high-strung,  sensitive  nature  that  was  Sarah's 
from  the  beginning.4 

When  Sarah  was  seven  she  was  sent  away  to 
boarding  school  at  Auteuil,  where  she  says  she 
spent  two  comparatively  happy  years.  Her 
mysterious  father  then  sent  orders  that  she  was 
to  be  transferred  to  a  convent.  l '  The  idea  that 

*  At  Neuilly  her  aunt  Rosine  came  one  day  to  see  her.  "I 
insisted  that  I  wanted  to  go  away  at  once.  In  a  gentle,  tender, 
caressing  voice,  but  without  any  real  affection,  she  said  all 
kinds  of  pretty  things.  She  then  went  away.  I  could  see 
nothing  but  the  dark,  black  hole  which  remained  there  im- 
mutable behind  me,  and  in  a  fit  of  despair  I  rushed  out  to  my 
aunt  who  was  just  getting  into  her  carriage.  After  that  I 
knew  nothing  more.  I  had  managed  to  escape  from  my  poor 
nurse  and  had  fallen  down  on  the  pavement.  I  had  broken  my 
arm  in  two  places  and  injured  my  knee  cap.  I  was  two  years 
recovering."  Memoirs. 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  7 

I  was  to  be  ordered  about  without  any  regard 
to  my  own  wishes  or  inclinations  put  me  into 
an  indescribable  rage.  I  rolled  about  on  the 
ground,  uttering  the  most  heartrending  cries. 
I  yelled  out  all  kinds  of  reproaches,  blaming 
mamma,  my  aunts,  and  Mine.  Fressard  for  not 
finding  some  way  to  keep  me  with  her.  The 
struggle  lasted  two  hours,  and  while  I  was  being 
dressed  I  escaped  twice  into  the  garden  and  at- 
tempted to  climb  the  trees  and  throw  myself 
into  the  pond,  in  which  there  was  more  mud 
than  water.  Finally,  when  I  was  completely 
exhausted  and  subdued,  I  was  taken  off  sobbing 
in  my  aunt's  carriage. "5 

At  the  Augustinian  convent  at  Grandchamp, 
Versailles,  she  was  baptized  and  confirmed  a 
Christian.  She  became  extravagantly  pious 
and  conceived  a  passionate  adoration  of  the 
Virgin.  Nevertheless,  she  was  fractious  and 
was  more  than  once  expelled.6 

*  Memoirs. 

e  "One  day,  when,  we  heard  that  all  the  schools  in  France, 
except  ours,  had  been  given  bonbons  on  the  occasion  of  the 
baptism  of  the  Prince  Imperial,  I  proposed  to  several  other 
girls  that  we  should  run  away,  and  I  undertook  to  manage  it. 
Being  on  good  terms  with  the  sister  in  charge  of  the  gate,  I 
went  into  her  lodge  and  pretended  to  have  a  hole  in  my  dress 
under  the  armpit.  To  let  her  examine  the  hole  I  raised  my 
arms  toward  the  cord  communicating  with  the  gate,  and 
whilst  she  was  looking  at  my  dress  I  pulled  the  cord,  my 
accomplices  rushed  out,  and  I  followed  them.  Our  entire  stock 
of  provisions,  ammunition,  and  sinews  of  war  consisted  of  a 
few  clothes,  three  pieces  of  soap  in  a  bag,  and  the  sum  of  seven 
francs  fifty  centimes  in  money.  This  was  to  take  us  to  the 
other  end  of  the  world !  A  search  had  to  be  made  for  us,  and  as 
the  good  sisters  could  hardly  undertake  it,  the  police  were 
set  on  our  track.  There  was  not  much  difficulty  in  finding  us, 


8        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

When  she  left  the  convent  Sarah  was  a 
capricious,  sensitive,  religious  girl,  who  must 
indeed  have  constituted  a  problem  for  her 
mother.  Sarah,  strangely  enough,  was  herself 
strongly  inclined  to  be  a  nun.  But  her  mother, 
who  was  a  woman  of  the  world  and  of  means, 
had  other  plans  and  provided  as  '  '  finishing  gov- 
erness" for  Sarah  a  Mile,  de  Brabander.  One 
day,  when  she  was  fifteen,  her  fate  was  de- 
cided for  her.  At  a  family  council  her  own  am- 
bition to  be  a  nun  was  voted  down  and  the  de- 
cision was:  "Send  her  to  the  Conservatoire." 
Sarah  had  never  even  heard  of  the  famous 
school  for  actors  of  the  government  theatres. 
That  same  evening  she  was  taken  to  the  theatre 
for  the  first  time — the  Theatre  Frangais.  Brit- 
tanicus  and  Amphitrion  moved  her  profoundly, 
and  she  left  the  theatre  weeping,  as  much  for 
the  sudden  shattering  of  her  cherished  plan  as 
from  the  effects  of  the  plays. 

Thus  she  began  her  studies  at  the  Conserva- 
toire (1860)  with  no  love  for  the  career  chosen 
for  her.7  She  was  no  beauty; — she  was  decid- 

as  you  may  imagine.  I  was  sent  home  in  disgrace.  On 
another  occasion,  I  had  climbed  on  to  the  wall  separating  the 
convent  from  the  cemetery.  A  grand  funeral  was  in  prog- 
ress and  the  Bishop  of  Versailles  was  delivering  an  address.  I 
immediately  began  to  gesticulate,  shout  and  sing  at  the  top 
of  my  voice  so  as  to  interrupt  the  ceremony.  You  can  imagine 
the  scene — a  child  of  twelve  sitting  astride  a  wall,  and  a 
bishop  interrupted  in  the  midst  of  a  funeral  oration!  The 
scandal  was  great." — Huret. 

7  "Consequently  I  entered  the  Conservatoire.  The  next  ques- 
tion was,  in  which  class  was  I  to  study?  Beauvallet  said: 
'She  will  be  a  tragedienne.'  Regnier  maintained:  'She  will 
be  a  comedienne,'  and  Provost  put  them  in  agreement  by  de- 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  9 

edly  thin,  had  kinky  hair,  and  a  pale  face.  But 
she  worked  hard.  Her  extraordinary  nervous 
energy  and  her  intelligence  had  their  effect  and 
when  she  left  the  Conservatoire  she  had  won 
two  second  prizes.8  The  discernment  of  some 
of  the  judges  9  saw  in  her  something  of  the  ar- 
tist she  was  to  be,  and  she  immediately  had  a 
call  to  the  company  of  the  Comedie  Frangaise. 
With  the  signing  of  her  contract  came  her  re- 
solve, that  if  the  stage  were  to  be  her  working 
place,  she  would  throw  herself  into  her  task 
with  all  her  soul.  " Quand-meme," — in  spite  of 
all, — was  already  her  motto, — she  would,  in  the 
face  of  any  obstacle,  win  a  place  for  herself.10 
Though  with  wonderful  success  she  has  been 
busily  pursuing  that  object  from  that  day  to 

claring:     'She  will  be  both.'     I  joined  Provost's  class." — Huret. 
s  One  for  tragedy   in   1861,   and  one  for   comedy  in   1862. 
She  never  won  a  first  prize. 

9  M.  Regnier  and  M.  Doucet  among  them.     Both  had  been  her 
teachers,  as  had  M.   Provost  and  M.   Samson,  the  latter  of 
whom  had  taught  Rachel. 

10  She  says  she  had  chosen  this  device  at  the  age  of  nine, 
"after  a  formidable  jump  over  a  ditch  which  no  one  could  jump, 
and  which  my  young  cousin  had  dared  me  to  attempt.     I  had 
hurt   my  face,  broken  my  wrist  and  was  in  pain  all  over. 
While  I  was  being  carried  home  I  exclaimed  furiously:     'Yes, 
I  would  do  it  again,  quand-meme,  if  any  one  dared  me  again. 
And  I  will  always  do  what  I  want  to  all  my  life/"    In  the  even- 
ing of  that  day,  my  aunt,  who  was  grieved  to  see  me  in  such 
pain,  asked  me  what  would  give  me  any  pleasure.     My  poor 
little  body  was  all  bandaged,  but  I  jumped  with  joy  at  this,  and 
quite  consoled  I  whispered  in  a  coaxing  way:     'I  should  like 
to  have  some  writing  paper  with  a  motto  of  my  own.'     My 
mother  asked  me  rather  slyly  what  my  motto  was.     I  did  not 
answer  for  a   minute,   and  then,    as   they   were  all   waiting 
quietly,  I  uttered  such  a  furious  'Quand-meme!'  that  my  Aunt 
Faure  started  back  muttering:     'What  a  terrible  child!' " 


10      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

this,  the  beginnings  of  her  career  were  not 
promising.  Her  debut  (1862)  in  Racine's 
Iphigenie  created  no  particular  comment.  She 
remembers,  however,  that  on  that  occasion, 
when  she  lifted  her  long  and  extraordinarily 
thin  arms,  for  the  sacrifice,  the  audience 
laughed.11  Other  parts  fell  to  her,  but  she  did 
not  long  remain  at  the  House  of  Moliere.  As 
other  managers  were  later  to  learn,  Sarah  cared 
little  for  agreements  and  contracts. 

The  occasion  of  her  first  desertion  of  the 
Comedie  was  trivial  enough.  Here  at  the  great 
national  theatre  she  expected  to  remain  always, 
but  one  day  her  sister  trod  on  the  gown  of  Mme. 
Nathalie,  another  actress  of  the  company,  "old, 
spiteful  and  surly, "  who  in  petty  anger  shoved 
the  girl  aside.  Sarah  promptly  responded  by 
boxing  the  ears  of  her  elder  colleague.  Neither 
would  apologize,  and  the  quickly  achieved  re- 
sult was  that  the  younger  actress  retired. 

She  remained  away  from  the  Comedie  Fran- 
qaise  for  ten  years,  and  it  was  during  this  time 
that  she  laid  the  foundation  of  her  fame.  Brief 
engagements  at  the  Gymnase  12  and  the  Porte 

11  The  great  critic  Sarcey's  comments  in  L'Opinion  Rationale 
were  read  to  her  by  her  mother:  "Mile.  Bernhardt,  who  made 
her  debut  yesterday  in  the  r6le  of  Iphiggnie,  is  a  tall,  pretty 
girl  with  a  slender  figure  and  a  very  pleasing  expression. 
The  upper  part  of  her  face  is  remarkably  beautiful.  She 
holds  herself  well,  and  her  enunciation  is  perfectly  clear. 
This  is  all  that  can  be  said  far  her  at  present."  "The  man 
is  an  idiot,"  said  her  mother,  "you  were  charming." — Memoirs. 

i*  Characteristically,  she  brought  her  engagement  at  the 
Gymnase  to  a  sudden  close  by  quietly  going  to  Spain  the  day 
after  the  first  performance  of  a  play  in  which  she  disliked 
her  part. 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  11 

St.  Martin  were  followed  by  an  opportunity  to 
join  the  company  at  the  Odeon.  MM.  Chilly 
and  Duquesnel  were  the  managers.  The  latter 
was  young,  kind  to  Sarah,  and  discerning  of 
her  talents.  As  for  Chilly,  he  was  less  enthu- 
siastic: "M.  Duquesnel  is  responsible  for  you. 
I  should  not  upon  any  account  have  en- 
gaged you." 

"And  if  you  had  been  alone,  monsieur,"  she 
answered,  "I  should  not  have  signed,  so  we  are 
quits. ' ' 

Mile.  Bernhardt's  career — once  she  had 
launched  herself  upon  it — divides  naturally 
into  three  periods:  the  six  years  (1866-1872)  at 
the  Odeon,  the  playhouse  of  the  Latin  Quarter, 
"the  theatre,"  she  says,  "that  I  have  loved 
most";  another  term  (1872-1880)  at  the  Fran- 
gaise;  and  her  long  career  since,  during  which 
she  has  been  her  own  mistress,  .accepting  en- 
gagements where  it  pleased  her,  managing 
theatres  of  her  own,  and  traveling  over  all  the 
world. 

Her  first  taste  of  success  came  when  she 
played  Zacharie  in  Athalie,  soon  after  she  went 
to  the  Odeon.  It  fell  to  her  to  recite  the 
choruses,  and  the  "voix  d'or"  won  its  first 
triumph.  She  was  now  twenty-two.  For  four 
years,  with  plentiful  interludes  of  temper  and 
temperament,  she  had  been  striving  for  success. 
Now,  at  the  Odeon,  she  worked  and  worked 
hard.  "I  was  always  ready  to  take  any  one's 
place  at  a  moment's  notice,  for  I  knew  all  the 
roles."  Chilly,  who  at  first  could  see  only  her 


12        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

thinness 13  and  not  her  ability,  was  brought 
round  to  DuquesnePs  view  of  her.  "I  used  to 
think,"  she  says  again,  "of  my  few  months  at 
the  Comedie  Frangaise.  The  little  world  I  had 
known  there  had  been  stiff,  scandal-mongering, 
and  jealous.  At  the  Odeon  I  was  very  happy. 
We  thought  of  nothing  but  putting  on  plays, 
and  we  rehearsed  morning,  afternoon,  and  at 
all  hours,  and  I  liked  that  very  much. ' ' 14 

At  the  Odeon  Sarah  soon  became  the  favorite 
of  the  students  of  the  Quartier.  Eather  to  the 
disgust  of  the  older  patrons  of  the  house,  the 
students  were  indiscriminate  in  their  appre- 
ciation of  the  young  actress,  and  applauded 
her  indifferent  work  equally  with  her  suc- 
cesses. 

For  successes  she  now  began  to  have.  With 
difficulty  M.  Chilly  was  induced  to  consent  to 
the  production  of  CoppeVs  one-act  play  Le 
Passant.  But  so  successful  was  it  that  it  not 

13  Thin  she  was,  and  thin  she  remained.     She  once  said,  in 
after  years:     "As  for  me,  if  I  should  cease  to  be  thin,  what 
would  become  of  some  of  the  Paris  journalists?     Scarcely  a 
day  but  they  have  some  mot  about  me  personally.     Really  I 
am  almost  the  raison  d'etre  of  some  of  these  small  wits!" 

14  She  played  at  the  Odeon :     Albine  in  Britanmcus;  Sylvia 
in  Le  Jeu  de  V Amour  et  du  Hasard;  Zacharie  in  Athalie;  the 
Baroness  in  Le  Marquis  de  Villemer;  Mariette  in  Francois  le 
Champi;  Hortense  in  Le  Testament  de  Cesar  Oiroddt;  Anna 
Damby    in    Eean     (Dumas'    Sullivan)  ;     in    La    Loterie    du 
Mariage;  Zanetto  in  Le  Passant  by  Coppe"e;   in  L'Autre  by 
George  Sand;  Armande  in  Les  Femmes  Savantes;  Cordelia  in 
King  Lear;  in  Le  Bdtard;  L'Affranchi;  Jean-Marie,  by  Andre 
Theuriet;  Les  ArrGts  by  de  Boissieres,  Le  Legs;  Le  Drame  de 
la  Rue  de  la  Paix;  Fais  ce  quo  dois,  by  Coppe"e;  La  Baronne 
by  Edmond  and  Foussier ;  Mile.  A'isse;  and  the  Queen  of  Spain 
in  Ruy  Bias  by  Victor  Hugo. 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  13 

only  ran  for  a  hundred  nights,  but  Bernhardt 
and  the  beautiful  Mile.  Agar  played  it  for  Na- 
poleon and  Eugenie  at  the  Tuileries.  In  Kean, 
by  Dumas,  she  was,  by  all  accounts,  admir- 
able.15 

George  Sand  came  to  the  Odeon  for  the  re- 
hearsals of  her  play  L'Autre.  Of  her  Bern- 
hardt says:  "Mme.  George  Sand  was  a  sweet 
charming  creature,  extremely  timid.  She  did 
not  talk  much  but  smoked  all  the  time." 

In  the  midst  of  her  term  at  the  Odeon  came 
an  astonishing  episode  in  Bernhardt 's  career — 
her  activities  during  the 'Franco-Prussian  War 
of  1870-71.  The  theatres  were  of  course  closed, 
but  it  was  not  in  her  nature  to  sit  still  and  do 
nothing.  Therefore  she  sent  her  young  son  16 
out  of  the  city,  and  in  the  fall  of  1870,  after  her 
own  severe  illness,  proceeded  to  establish  an 
army  hospital  in  the  foyers  of  the  Odeon,  with 
herself  as  its  working  head.  With  an  execu- 
tive ability  and  a  zeal  characteristic  but  none 
the  less  remarkable,  she  not  only  organized  its 

is  On  the  first  night  of  Dumas'  play,  the  distinguished  author 
was  the  victim  of  a  remarkable  demonstration  by  the  audience. 
He  sat  in  a  box  with  "Oceana."  The  novelist's  alliance  with 
this  woman  was  evidently  unpopular,  for  a  great  shout  was 
sent  up  and  many  in  the  audience  were  heard  to  call  for  the 
woman's  removal.  In  the  midst  of  the  uproar  the  play, 
already  long  delayed,  was  begun.  The  woman  finally  left  the 
house.  The  Figaro  next  day  said:  "Mile.  Sarah  Bernhardt 
appeared  wearing  an  eccentric  costume,  which  increased  the 
tumult,  but  her  rich  voice — that  astonishing  voice  of  hers — 
appealed  to  the  public,  and  she  charmed  them  like  a  little 
Orpheus." 

is  Now  about  five.  Although  she  was  a  mother  Sarah  had 
not  yet  married. 


14      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

commissariat,  and  kept  all  the  records  and  ac- 
counts, but  herself  acted  as  one  of  the  nurses. 
The  section  of  her  autobiography  that  deals 
with  the  siege  of  Paris  and  with  her  journey 
through  the  enemy's  country  to  Hombourg  and 
back  that  she  might  bring  home  her  family,  will 
afford  some  future  historian  a  graphic  impres- 
sion of  one  of  the  saddest  days  in  the  history  of 
Paris. 

When  the  Odeon  reopened,  in  the  fall  of  1871, 
Sarcey,  the  great  critic,  said  of  Sarah,  who 
played  (in  Jean-Marie)  a  young  Breton  girl: 
"No  one  could  be  more  innocently  poetic  than 
this  young  lady.  She  will  become  a  great  come- 
dienne, and  she  is  already  an  admirable  artist. 
Everything  she  does  has  a  special  savor  of  its 
own.  It  is  impossible  to  say  whether  she  is 
pretty.  She  is  thin,  and  her  expression  is  sad, 
but  she  has  queenly  grace,  charm,  and  the  inex- 
pressible je  ne  sais  quoi.  She  is  an  artist  by 
nature,  and  an  incomparable  one.  There  is  no 
one  like  her  at  the  Comedie  Frangwse." 

At  the  end  of  1871  Victor  Hugo,  who  had  been 
practically  an  exile  during  the  Empire,  came 
back  to  France.  His  return,  as  it  proved, 
meant  another  turning  point  in  Sarah's  life,  for 
when  the  Odeon  decided  to  produce  his  Ruy 
Bias,  she  was  selected,  after  a  good  deal  of 
bickering,  as  the  Queen.  Hugo  she  found,  de- 
spite her  strong  previous  prejudice  against  him, 
"charming,  so  witty  and  refined,  and  so  gal- 
lant. "17 

"Mme.  Bernhardt  tells  a  rather  pretty  story  of  the  great 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  15 

The  play  was  produced  on  January  26,  1872. 
That  night,  in  Bernhardt's  own  words,  "rent 
asunder  the  thin  veil  which  still  made  my 
future  hazy,  and  I  felt  that  I  was  destined  for 
celebrity.  Until  that  day  I  had  remained  the 
students'  little  Fairy.  I  became  then  the  elect 
of  the  Public."  Hugo  himself,  on  his  knee, 
kissed  her  hands  and  thanked  her.  M.  Sarcey, 
who  from  the  beginning  was  Bernhardt's 
staunchest  admirer  among  the  critics,  praised 
her  warmly :  '  '  No  role  was  ever  better  adapted 
to  Mile.  Bernhardt's  talents.  She  possesses  the 
gift  of  resigned  and  patient  dignity.  Her  dic- 
tion is  so  wonderfully  clear  and  distinct  that 
not  a  syllable  is  missed." 

The  Comedie  Francaise  now  made  overtures 
for  her  return  to  its  fold.  Bernhardt  at  once 

novelist:  "One  day  when  the  rehearsal  was  over  an  hour 
earlier  than  usual,  I  was  waiting,  my  forehead  pressed  against 
the  window  pane,  for  the  arrival  of  Mme.  Gugrard,  who  was 
coming  to  fetch  me.  I  was  gazing  idly  at  the  footpath 
opposite,  which  is  bounded  by  the  Luxembourg  railings. 
Victor  Hugo  had  just  crossed  the  road  and  was  about  to  walk 
in.  An  old  woman  attracted  his  attention.  She  had  just  put 
a  heavy  bundle  of  linen  down  on  the  ground  and  was  wiping 
her  forehead,  on  which  were  great  beads  of  perspiration.  In 
spite  of  the  cold,  her  toothless  mouth  was  half  open,  as  she 
was  panting  and  her  eyes  had  an  expression  of  distressing 
anxiety,  as  she  looked  at  the  wide  road  she  had  to  cross,  with 
carriages  and  omnibuses  passing  each  other.  Victor  Hugo 
approached  her,  and  after  a  short  conversation,  he  drew  a 
piece  of  money  from  his  pocket,  handed  it  to  her,  then  taking 
off  his  hat  he  confided  it  to  her  and,  with  a  quick  movement 
and  a  laughing  face,  lifted  the  bundle  to  his  shoulder  and 
crossed  the  road,  followed  by  the  bewildered  woman.  The  next 
day  I  told  the  poet  that  I  had  witnessed  his  delicate,  good 
deed.  'Oh,J  said  Paul  Maurice,  'every  day  that  dawns  is  a 
day  of  kindness  for  him!'" 


16        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

accepted,  which  was  wretchedly  unfair  to  the 
Odeon,  for  she  owed  much  to  Duquesnel.  When 
in  1866  he  persuaded  Chilly  to  take  her  on,  she 
was  comparatively  unknown;  now,  in  1872,  she 
was  rapidly  becoming  the  talk  of  Paris.  Her 
contract  with  the  Odeon  had  yet  a  year  to  run, 
but  Sarah  demanded,  as  the  condition  of  her 
remaining,  an  advance  in  the  stipulated 
salary.18  Chilly  indignantly  refused;  so  Mile. 
Bernhardt  hurried  away  to  the  Comedie  and 
forthwith  signed  her  new  contract.  The  Odeon 
brought  an  action  against  her  and  she  had  to 
pay  a  forfeit  of  six  thousand  francs. 

This  sudden  change  of  scene  is  but  one  in- 
stance of  the  directness,  not  to  say  unscrupu- 
lousness,  of  Bernhardt 's  methods  in  advancing 
herself.  "Quond-tneme"  it  was  to  be,  at  any 
cost.  If  she  had  merely  followed  her  inclina- 
tions, however,  she  would  probably  have  re- 
mained at  the  Odeon,  for  she  has  often  pro- 
tested the  attraction  for  her  of  the  scene  of  her 
first  triumphs.  The  Comedie,  on  the  other 
hand,  had  never  this  appeal  to  her.  As  is  easily 
understood,  her  imperiousness  and  willfulness 
made  her  feel  less  at  home  at  the  more  staid 
Comedie.  The  other  members  of  her  company, 
with  a  few  exceptions,  were  unfriendly  and  jeal- 
ous. Moreover  she  made  almost  a  failure  in 
her  debut  (in  Mile,  de  Belle-Isle),  but  this  was 
due  not  to  stage-fright,  as  Sarcey  guessed,  but 
to  her  anxiety  on  seeing  her  mother,  suddenly 

is  It  was  small  enough,  to  be  sure.  Her  demand  was  for 
only  15,000  francs  ($3,000)  a  year. 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  17 

taken  ill,  leave  the  theatre.  Sarcey  loyally 
championed  her  early  efforts,  though  he  was 
often  keenly  critical  also:  "I  fear,"  he  wrote 
(apropos  of  Dalila),  "that  the  management  has 
made  a  mistake  in  already  giving  Mile.  Sarah 
Bernhardt  leading  parts.  I  do  not  know 
whether  she  will  ever  be  able  to  fill  them,  but 
she  certainly  cannot  do  so  at  present.  She  is 
wanting  in  power  and  breadth  of  conception. 
She  impersonates  soft  and  gentle  characters 
admirably,  but  her  failings  become  manifest 
when  the  whole  burden  of  the  piece  rests  on  her 
fair  shoulders."  Other  critics,  particularly 
Paul  de  Saint- Victor,  were  consistently  hostile. 
She  had  in  the  company  envious  rivals  who  in- 
spired attacks  on  her,  and  she  clashed  fre- 
quently with  M.  Perrin,  the  director  of  the  the- 
atre. With  that  indomitable  persistence  that  is 
her  finest  trait,  however,  she  kept  right  on,  and 
won  her  way  to  genuine  achievement.  As  Ari- 
cie  in  Phedre  she  made  a  secondary  part  no- 
table. Thus  Sarcey :  '  '  There  can  be  no  doubt 
about  it  now.  All  the  opposition  to  Mile.  Bern- 
hardt must  yield  to  facts.  She  simply  de- 
lighted the  public.  The  beautiful  verses 
allotted  to  Aricie  were  never  better  delivered. 
Her  voice  is  genuine  music.  There  was  a  con- 
tinuous thrill  of  pleasure  among  the  entire  audi- 
ence." 

That  she  had  thoroughly  arrived  was  soon 
to  be  proved  and  re-proved.    Zaire 19  was  fol- 
ia it  was  on  the  occasion  of  the  first  night  of  this  play  that 
she  says  she  reverted  to  a  trick  of  her  childhood.    Once  when 


18        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

lowed  by  Phedre  herself,  Berthe  in  La  Fille  de 
Roland,  Dona  Sol  in  Hernani,  Monime  in  Mith- 
ridate,  and  revivals  of  Ruy  Bias  and  Le  Sphinx, 
each  a  personal  triumph  for  the  actress  who 
was  so  rapidly  filling  the  eye  of  Paris.20 

For  Sarah  Bernhardt  had  by  now  succeeded 
in  making  herself,  if  not  a  universally  acknowl- 
edged artist,  at  least  a  real  Parisian  celebrity. 

she  had  been  fed  something  disagreeable,  Sarah  deliber- 
ately drank  off  a  bottle  of  ink  in  the  hope  that  she  would  die 
and  vex  her  mother.  Now  when  Perrin  refused  her  a  month's 
needed  holiday  and  forced  her  to  play  Zaire  in  midsummer: 
"I  was  determined  to  faint,  determined  to  vomit  blood, 
determined  to  die,  in  order  to  enrage  Perrin.  Although  the 
r6le  was  easy,  it  required  two  or  three  shrieks  which  might 
have  provoked  the  vomiting  of  blood  that  frequently  troubled 
me  at  that  time,  I  uttered  my  shrieks  with  real  rage  and 
suffering,  hoping  to  break  something.  But  my  surprise  was 
great  when  the  curtain  fell  at  the  end  of  the  piece,  and  I  got 
up  quickly  to  answer  to  the  call  and  salute  the  public  without 
languor,  without  fainting,  ready  to  recommence  the  piece.  I 
had  commenced  the  performance  in  such  a  state  of  weakness 
that  it  was  easy  to  predict  that  I  should  not  finish  the  first 
act  without  fainting.  And  I  marked  this  performance  with  a 
little  white  stone — for  that  day  I  learned  that  my  vital  force 
was  at  the  service  of  my  intellect."  This  is  a  significant 
passage.  It  helps  to  explain  the  wonder  of  Bernhardt's 
unexampled  vitality  in  the  face  of  hard  work  and  a  frail 
physique. 

20  She  remained  at  the  Come'die  this  time  eight  years,  1872- 
1880.  Her  first  appearances  were:  Gabrielle  in  Mile,  de 
Belle  Isle,  Junie  in  Britannicus,  1872;  Ch6rubin  in  Le  Mariage 
de  Figaro,  Leonora  in  Dalila,  Mrs.  Douglas  in  L' Absent, 
Marthe  in  Chez  I'Avocat,  Andromaque,  Aricie  in  Phedre, 
1873;  Peril  en  la  Demeure,  Berthe  de  Savigny  in  Le  Sphinx, 
La  Belle  Paule,  Zaire,  Phedre  in  Phedre,  1874;  Berthe  in 
La  Fille  de  Roland,  Gabrielle,  1875;  Mrs.  Clarkson  in 
L'Etrangere,  Posthumia  in  Rome  Vaincue,  1876;  Dona  Sol  in 
Hernani,  1877;  Desdemona  in  Aicard's  Othello  (once  only), 
Alcmene  in  Amphitrion,  1878;  Monime  in  Mithridate,  1879; 
Clorinde  in  L'Aventuriere,  1880. 


SAEAH  BEENHARDT  19 

It  was  not  a  reputation  confined  to  the  actress 
per  se.  Designedly  or  not,  Sarah  set  the 
tongues  of  Paris  (and  shortly  of  all  Europe) 
•wagging  by  a  continuous  exhibition  of  eccen- 
tricity that  amounts  to  a  tradition.  To  men- 
tion only  what  seem  to  be  well  authenticated 
manifestations  of  her  caprice:  She  kept  a 
pearwood  coffin  at  the  foot  of  her  bed,  slept  in 
it  and  learned  her  parts  in  it.  It  is  to  be  the 
veritable  coffin  of  her  last  resting  place.21  She 
kept  as  a  further  reminder  of  her  mortality  a 
complete  human  skeleton  in  her  bedroom. 
Years  before  she  had  a  tortoise  as  a  household 
pet.  She  named  it  Chrysogere  and  had  a  shell 
of  gold,  set  with  topazes,  fitted  to  its  back. 
Now  she  was  keeping  two  Russian  greyhounds, 
a  poodle,  a  bulldog,  a  terrier,  a  leveret,  a  mon- 
key, three  cats,  a  parrot,  and  several  other  birds. 
Later  she  had  lions,  and  an  alligator!  She 
made  ascents  in  a  captive  balloon  at  the  Exhibi- 
tion and  once  in  a  balloon  that  was  not  cap- 
tive.22 Perrin  was  outraged  by  this  caprice 
and  tried  to  fine  her  for  "traveling  without 
leave."  She  wrote  for  the  newspapers.  She 
scorned  the  fashions.  She  dabbled  in  painting 
and  sculpture,  and,  particularly  with  her  chisel, 
her  efforts  were,  if  not  noteworthy,  at  least  re- 
spectable. Indeed,  a  group  sculpture  won  an 
honorable  mention  in  the  Salon  of  1876,  though 

21  For  many  years  her  tomb   in   Pere   Lachaise  has  been 
awaiting  her. 

22  She  published   an   account   of   these   aerial   experiences : 
Dana  les  nuages;  Impressions  d'une  Chaise. 


20        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

there  were  plenty  to  deny  that  it  was  really  her 
work.  Her  studiolike  apartment  was  the  ren- 
dezvous of  all  artistic  Paris. 

In  1879  her  poetic,  restrained,  and  generally 
admirable  impersonation  of  Dona  Sol  in  Her- 
nani  brought  her  general  homage.  On  the 
night  of  the  one-hundredth  performance  Victor 
Hugo  presided  at  a  banquet  in  her  honor,  and 
M.  Sarcey,  in  behalf  of  her  "many  admiring 
friends,"  presented  to  her  a  necklace  of  dia- 
monds. 

When  it  was  proposed,  in  1879,  that  the 
Comedie  Frangaise  company  go  to  London, 
Sarah  refused  to  go  along  unless  she  be  made 
Associate  "a  parte  entiere."2*  Her  proposal 
was  rejected,  and  at  a  meeting  of  the  Commit- 
tee M.  Got  represented  the  feeling  that  pre- 
vailed among  the  directors  of  the  theatre  by 
crying:  "Well,  let  her  stay  away!  She  is  a 
regular  nuisance!"  Sarah  finally  gave  in, 
however,  and  in  reward  was  made  "Societaire 
a  parte  entiere."24 

23  The  Associates  or  Bocietaires  of  the  Comedie  FranQaise 
are  sharers  in  the  profits,  a  custom  that  has  come  down  from 
the  days  of  Moliere.  A  member  of  the  company  is  at  first  a 
pensionnaire,  and  serves  upon  a  salary  only.  After  proving 
his  worth  he  is  made  Societaire.  He  does  not  at  once  receive  a 
full  share  of  the  profits,  however,  but  must  progress  from 
an  eighth,  fourth  and  half  share  to  the  full  rank  of  Societaire 
a  parte  entiere.  Bernhardt  had  been  made  Soddtaire  in 
1875.  During  the  year  1879  the  share  received  by  the  lead- 
ing actors  and  actresses  of  the  Comedie  varied  from  55,000 
to  70,000  francs,  besides  their  salaries.  Sarah's  share  was 
62,000  francs. 

2*Perrin  and  his  fellow  directors  were  not  the  only  ones 
who  felt  the  strain  imposed  by  Sarah's  presence  on  earth.  She 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  21 

On  the  first  evening  at  the  Gaiety,  Bernhardt 
was  to  make  her  bow  to  England  in  the  second 
act  of  Phedre.  Just  before  she  went  on  she  had 
one  of  her  occasional  bad  attacks  of  stage 
fright,  and  could  not  remember  her  lines. 
"When  I  began  my  part,"  she  wrote,  "as  I  had 
lost  my  self-possession,  I  started  on  rather  too 
high  a  note,  and  when  once  in  full  swing  I 
could  not  get  lower  again;  I  simply  could  not 
stop.  I  suffered,  I  wept,  I  implored,  I  cried 
out,  and  it  was  all  real.  My  suffering  was  hor- 
rible.'' The  Telegraph  next  morning  said: 
"Clearly  Mile.  Sarah  Bernhardt  exerted  every 
nerve  and  fiber  and  her  passion  grew  with  the 
excitement  of  the  spectators,  for  when  after  a 
recall  that  could  not  be  resisted  the  curtain 
drew  up,  Mr.  Mounet-Sully  was  seen  support- 
ing the  exhausted  figure  of  the  actress,  who  had 
won  her  triumph  only  after  tremendous  physi- 
cal exertion,  and  triumph  it  was,  however  short 
and  sudden." 

An  American  writer — probably  Henry  James 
— said  at  this  time  in  the  Nation:  "It  would 
require  some  ingenuity  to  give  an  idea  of  the 
intensity,  the  ecstasy,  the  insanity,  as  some  peo- 
ple would  say,  of  curiosity  and  enthusiasm  pro- 
voked by  Mile.  Bernhardt.  .  .  .  She  is  not,  to 
my  sense,  a  celebrity  because  she  is  an  artist. 
She  is  a  celebrity  because,  apparently,  she  de- 
sires, with  an  intensity  that  has  rarely  been 

herself  tells  of  the  dying  words  of  Charles  Varrey:  "I  am 
content  to  die  because  I  shall  hear  no  more  of  Sarah  Bern- 
hardt and  the  great  Frangais."  The  latter  was  de  Lesseps, 
then  much  in  the  public  eye. 


22        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

equaled,  to  be  one,  and  because  all  ends  are 
alike  to  her.  .  .  .  She  has  compassed  her  ends 
with  a  completeness  which  makes  of  her  a  sort 
of  fantastically  impertinent  victrix  poised  upon 
a  perfect  pyramid  of  ruins — the  ruins  of  a  hun- 
dred British  prejudices  and  proprieties.  .  .  . 
The  trade  of  a  celebrity,  pure  and  simple,  had 
been  invented,  I  think,  before  she  came  to  Lon- 
don; if  it  had  not  been,  it  is  certain  that  she 
would  have  discovered  it.  She  has  in  a  su- 
preme degree  what  the  French  call  the  genie 
de  la  reclame — the  advertising  genius;  she 
may,  indeed,  be  called  the  muse  of  the  news- 
paper." 

But  trouble  was  brewing,  and  the  irrepressi- 
ble Sarah  was  soon  making  difficulties  for  her 
confreres.  She  insisted  on  her  right  to  give 
performances  before  private  audiences  on  the 
nights  she  was  not  appearing  with  the  company. 
Perrin  had  flown  into  a  rage  when  he  first  heard 
of  these  performances,  for  it  was  the  Comedie's 
chief  grievance  against  her  that  she  would  not 
rest.  There  came  a  day  in  London  when  Sarah 
sent  word  she  was  too  tired  to  appear.  A  Sat- 
urday audience  had  to  be  dismissed  at  the  last 
moment;  it  was  too  late  to  change  the  bill.  A 
great  commotion  ensued  among  the  company 
and  in  the  Paris  press.  So  many  and  varied 
were  the  attacks  on  her  that  she  was  on  the 
point  of  resignation.  She  had  brought  to  Lon- 
don a  number  of  her  sculptures  and  paintings 
and  gave  an  exhibition,  selling  a  few  pieces, 
and  entertaining  at  the  gallery  reception  a 


SARAH  BEENHARDT  23 

group  of  aristocrats  and  celebrities — Gladstone 
and  Leighton  among  them.  She  made  a  trip  to 
Liverpool  to  buy  more  lions,  and  came  back 
with  a  chetah,  a  wolf,  and  a  half  dozen  chame- 
leons to  add  to  her  menagerie.  The  members 
of  the  company  thought  she  was  ruining  the 
dignity  of  "Moliere's  House";  and  all  manner 
of  stories  were  told.  "It  was  said,"  she  wrote, 
"that  for  a  shilling  anyone  might  see  me 
dressed  as  a  man;  that  I  smoked  huge  cigars 
leaning  on  the  balcony  of  my  house ;  that  at  the 
various  receptions  when  I  gave  one-act  plays, 
I  took  my  maid  with  me  for  the  dialogue ;  that 
I  practiced  fencing  in  my  garden,  dressed  as  a 
pierrot  in  white,  and  that  when  taking  boxing 
lessons  I  had  broken  two  teeth  for  my  unfortu- 
nate professor."  These  stories  were  only  less 
dreadful  than  the  tales  told  in  Paris :  that  she 
had  thrown  a  live  kitten  into  the  fire,  and  poi- 
soned two  monkeys  with  her  own  hands ! 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  it  is  probable  that  Sarah 
was  finding  irksome  the  restrictions  of  the 
Comedie,  was  ambitious  to  earn  more  money 
and,  as  anxious  for  her  exit  from  the  company 
as  were  her  jealous  confreres,  was  only  wait- 
ing for  a  chance  to  sever  her  contract.  But 
contracts  with  the  Frangaise  are  not  lightly 
broken.  As  Coquelin  had  told  her:  "When 
one  has  the  good  fortune  and  the  honor  of  be- 
longing to  the  Comedie  Frangaise  one  must  re- 
main there  until  the  end  of  one's  career."  She 
had  to  watch  her  chance  shrewdly. 

Again  returned  to  Paris,  the  company  of  the 


24        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Comedie  revived,  on  April  17,  1880,  Augier's 
L'Aventuriere.  From  whatever  cause — pique 
at  being  assigned  a  part  she  disliked  in  a  play 
she  detested,  a  temporary  suspension  of  her 
usual  power,  or,  as  she  says  herself,  illness  that 
prevented  proper  study  of  her  part, — she  failed 
rather  miserably.  Even  the  usually  indulgent 
Sarcey  said:  "Her  Clorinde  was  absolutely 
colorless";  and  the  other  critics,  to  a  man, 
wrote  scathing  reviews.  Sarah  saw  her  chance, 
as  she  thought,  and  determined  that  this  would 
be  her  last  performance  at  the  Comedie.  The 
morning  after  the  fiasco  she  wrote  to  Perrin : 

"Monsieur  I'Administrateur: 

1  'You  made  me  play  before  I  was  ready.  You  gave 
me  only  eight  stage  rehearsals,  and  there  were  only 
three  full  rehearsals  of  the  piece.  I  could  not  make 
up  my  mind  to  appear  under  such  conditions,  but  you 
insisted  upon  it.  What  I  foresaw  has  come  to  pass, 
and  the  result  of  the  performance  has  even  gone  be- 
yond what  I  expected.  One  critic  actually  charges 
me  with  playing  Virginie  in  L'Assommoir  instead  of 
L'Aventuriere!  May  Emile  Augier  and  Zola  absolve 
me !  It  is  my  first  rebuff  at  the  Comedie,  and  it  shall 
be  my  last.  I  warned  you  at  the  dress  rehearsal. 
You  have  gone  too  far.  I  now  keep  my  word.  When 
you  receive  this  letter  I  shall  have  left  Paris.  Be  good 
enough,  Monsieur  I'Administrateur,  to  accept  my  res- 
ignation as  from  this  moment. 

Apr.  18, 1880.  SARAH  BERNHARDT." 

An  immense  commotion  at  once  arose,  as  if 
some  tremendous  political  upheaval  had  oc- 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  25 

curred.  Sarah  took  train  and  disappeared  in 
the  country,  just  as  on  a  similar  occasion,  years 
before,  she  had  suddenly  gone  off  to  Spain. 
The  press,  her  fellow  players,  and  the  author 
of  the  play  all  poured  upon  her  head  a  shower 
of  abuse.  M.  Sarcey  prophesied:  "She  had 
better  not  deceive  herself.  Her  success  will  not 
be  lasting.  She  is  not  one  of  those  artistes  who 
can  bear  the  whole  weight  of  a  piece  on  their 
own  shoulders,  and  who  require  no  assistance 
to  hold  the  public  attention."25  The  Comedie 
took  legal  action  against  her,  and  a  few  months 
later,  when  the  suit  was  tried,  Sarah  was  for- 
mally deprived  of  her  standing  as  societaire,  of 
her  portion  of  the  reserve  fund,  amounting  to 
more  than  eight  thousand  dollars,  and  in  ad- 
dition had  to  pay  the  Frangaise  damages  of 
twenty  thousand  dollars.  She  hadn't  the 
money,  but  she  soon  earned  it,  on  her  first 
American  tour. 

So  ended,  for  good  and  all,  Bernhardt's  con- 
nection with  the  government  theatres;  so 
abruptly  did  she  turn  a  corner  in  her  remark- 
able career.  From  her  retirement  Sarah  an- 
nounced, absurdly  enough,  that  she  would  re- 
nounce the  stage,  and  live  by  painting  and 
sculpture,  for  these,  she  said,  brought  her 
thirty  thousand  francs  ($6,000)  a  year.  As  a 
matter  of  fact,  within  two  weeks  she  signed  a 

25  In  this  statement,  for  once,  M.  Sarcey  justified  Sardou's 
tribute,  inspired,  seven  years  later,  by  Sarcey's  criticism  of 
La  Tosca:  "Sarcey,  who  knows  nothing  about  painting, 
music,  architecture  or  sculpture,  and  to  whom  Nature  haa 
harshly  denied  all  sense  of  the  artistic." 


26        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

contract  with  Henry  E.  Abbey,  who  post-haste 
crossed  the  ocean  for  the  purpose,  to  go  to 
America.  His  English  agent,  Jarrett,  had  long 
been  importuning  her  to  go.  Now  she  was  glad 
to  accept.26 

Sarah's  wanderings  now  began — those  wan- 
derings that  have  carried  her  up  and  down  the 
world,  made  her  name  familiar  everywhere, 
brought  her  riches  and  (in  William  "Winter's 
sonorous  phrase)  "such  adulation  and  advo- 
cacy as  have  seldom  been  awarded  to  even 
the  authentic  benefactors  of  human  society." 
First  she  played  a  month  in  London,  giving  the 
pieces  she  was  preparing  for  the  American  tour, 
and  scoring  a  tremendous  success,  artistic,  fi- 
nancial and  social.  A  newspaper  writer  said  at 
this  time :  "It  has  been  said  here  that  English 
society  is  not  so  eager  this  season  to  make  her 
a  social  goddess  as  it  was  last;  but  it  would 
hardly  be  possible  for  a  woman  to  be  more 
thoroughly  besieged  than  is  Sarah — that  is  the 
name  by  which  people  generally  fondly  call  her. 
To  see  her  is  almost  as  difficult  as  to  see  the 
Queen — I  dare  say  for  people  not  connected 
with  the  artistic  world  even  more  so.  Sarah 
lives  very  comfortably — even  luxuriously — and 
entertains  lavishly.  It  seems  to  me  that  the 
only  lack  of  attention  that  she  could  possibly 
complain  of  is  that  the  Queen  has  not  yet  left 
her  card,  and  that  is  a  complaint  she  must  share 
with  many  people. " 

2«  She  was  to  have  $1,000  per  night,  half  the  receipts  over 
$3,000,  $200  a  week  for  hotel  bills,  and  a  special  car. 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  27 

To  her  amazement  the  Paris  critics  followed 
her  to  London,  and  praised  her  extravagantly. 
Sarcey  personally  tried  to  induce  her  to  return 
to  Paris,  and  M.  Perrin  sent  Got,  the  doyen  of 
the  Comedie,  on  the  same  errand.  Sarah  re- 
fused; she  was  enjoying  her  freedom  and  her 
large  earnings.  She  went  to  Belgium  and  then 
to  Denmark.  At  Copenhagen  she  brought  a 
storm  about  her  ears  by  a  gratuitous  affront  to 
the  German  Ambassador  to  Denmark,  Baron 
Magnus.  At  a  dinner  in  her  honor  he  gallantly 
proposed  a  health  to  "la  belle  France."  Sarah 
was  at  once  on  her  feet,  in  a  theatrical  mood, 
mindful  of  the  smarts  that  lingered  from  the 
war  of  1870-1871,  and  much  impressed  with  her 
own  importance.  "I  suppose,  Monsieur  I'Em- 
bassadeur  de  Prusse,"  she  cried,  "you  mean 
the  whole  of  France."  This  obvious  reference 
to  Alsace-Lorraine  put  the  amiable  Baron  to 
confusion,  broke  up  the  dinner,  threw  conster- 
nation into  the  French  diplomats  on  duty  in 
Copenhagen,  and  enraged  Bismarck.  It  is  only 
fair  to  say  that  Sarah  was  genuinely  sorry  for 
her  impetuous  "  break. " 

Before  sailing  for  America,  Sarah  was  pre- 
vailed upon  to  undertake  a  month's  provincial 
tour  in  France — something  she  had  never  done. 
She  appeared  in  Nantes,  Bordeaux,  Toulouse, 
Lyons  and  Geneva.  Everywhere  enthusiasm 
for  her  ran  high.  "Medals  bearing  her  image 
and  superscription,  Sarah  Bernhardt  bracelets 
and  collars,  photographs  and  biographies  were 
sold  in  the  streets.  At  Lyons  the  Khedive's 


28        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

son  unsuccessfully  offered  £80  for  a  stage- 
box."27 

On  October  16,  1880,  Mile.  Bernhardt  sailed 
for  New  York.  On  November  8,  at  Booth 's 
Theatre,  she  made  her  first  appearance  in  Am- 
erica in  Adrienne  Lecouvreur,  which,  with  much 
success,  she  had  added  to  her  repertoire  since 
leaving  the  Comedie.28  Her  triumph  was  im- 
mediate. She  had  been  told  that  New  York 
would  receive  her  coldly.  At  the  end  of  the 
play,  however,  "  there  was  quite  a  manifesta- 
tion and  everyone  was  deeply  moved,"  while 
after  the  play  a  large  crowd  serenaded  and 
cheered  before  her  hotel.  Sarah  had  been  put 
on  her  mettle,  and,  as  always,  she  did  her  best 
in  the  face  of  possible  opposition.  And  these 
ovations  repeated  themselves  in  each  city,  both 
in  the  United  States  and  in  Canada. 

The  Bishop  of  Montreal  took  it  upon  himself 
to  condemn  Bernhardt,  her  company,  her  plays, 
the  authors  and  French  literature  in  general. 
As  if  in  reply  to  his  utterances,  the  public 
flocked  to  see  Sarah.  As  is  usual  with  such 
strictures,  the  Bishop  had  given  the  best  pos- 

2T  Huret. 

28  She  played  on  this  tour:  La  Dame  au&  Camillas  (sixty- 
five  times)  ;  Frou-Frou  (forty-one  times)  ;  Adrienne  Lecou- 
vreur (seventeen)  ;  Hernani  (fourteen)  ;  Le  Sphinx  (seven)  ; 
Phedre  (six)  ;  La  Princesse  Georges  (three)  ;  and  L'Etrangere 
(three), — one  hundred  and  fifty-six  performances  in  all,  with 
average  receipts  of  $2,820.  She  acted  in  half  a  hundred  cities 
of  the  East,  Middle  West  and  South,  including  New  York, 
Boston,  Montreal,  Ottawa,  Springfield,  Philadelphia,  Baltimore, 
Chicago,  St.  Louis,  New  Orleans,  Cincinnati,  Memphis,  Louis- 
ville, Cleveland  and  Pittsburgh. 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  29 

sible  advertising29  and  each  night  Sarah's 
sleigh  was  dragged  by  cheering  men. 

Wherever  she  went,  her  astute  managers  saw 
to  it  that  the  Bernhardtian  advertising  tradi- 
tion was  maintained :  She  went  to  Menlo  Park 
to  call  on  Thomas  A.  Edison;  at  Boston  she 
visited  a  captive  live  whale  in  the  harbor,  and 
stood  (and  fell!)  upon  its  back;  in  Canada  she 
visited  a  tribe  of  Iroquois ;  at  Montreal  she  ven- 
tured on  the  ice  in  the  St.  Lawrence  and  put 
her  life  in  peril;  visiting  the  Colt  factory  at 
Springfield,  Massachusetts,  she  fired  off  some 
newly  invented  cannon; — "it  amused  me  very 
much  without  procuring  me  any  emotion,"  she 
wrote;  at  Chicago  she  witnessed  the  slaughter- 
ing of  pigs  at  the  stock-yards ;  in  St.  Louis  her 
jewelry  was  exhibited  in  a  store  window;  at 
Niagara  she  again  endangered  her  life  by  get- 
ting herself  into  an  awkward  place  on  the  ice 
bridge  below  the  falls. 

Her  object  was  accomplished,  at  all  events. 
She  had  won  in  America  a  new  fame  and  a  much 
needed  fortune.  She  had  earned  more  than  one 
hundred  and  eighty  thousand  dollars.  She  was 
now  able  to  pay  her  debt  to  the  Frangaise,  and 
had  a  comfortable  sum  left.  And  her  return 
to  France  was  a  veritable  return  from  Elba. 
Her  vessel  was  met  by  scores  of  small  boats, 
gay  with  welcoming  flags,  and  the  wharves  held 

2»  In  Chicago  another  bishop  attacked  Bernhardt  and  her 
plays.  Mr.  Abbey,  her  manager,  thereupon  sent  him  this 
letter:  "Whenever  I  visit  your  city  I  am  accustomed  to 
spend  four  hundred  dollars  in  advertising.  But  as  you  have 
done  the  advertising  for  me,  I  send  you  $200  for  your  poor." 


30        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

thousands  of  people  shouting:  "Vive  Sarah 
Bernhardt!"  Her  first  performance  in  France 
of  La  Dame  aux  Camelias,  at  Havre  in  May, 
1881,  was  "a  perfect  triumph." 

It  is  startling  to  reflect  that  a  woman  who 
thus  reached  the  zenith  of  her  career  a  genera- 
tion ago  is  still  a  working  actress.  What  a 
triumph  for  the  frail  physique  and  the  daunt- 
less will!  It  is  worth  while  to  get  a  picture 
of  her  at  about  the  time  of  her  American  tour, 
when  she  was  thirty-six  years  old.  A  corre- 
spondent who  visited  her  in  London  wrote: 
"I  never  was  more  agreeably  disappointed  in 
the  appearance  of  a  person  than  when  Sarah 
smilingly  and  merrily  tripped  into  the  room. 
She  looked  infinitely  fresher,  brighter  and  pret- 
tier than  I  had  ever  seen  her  on  the  stage.  Her 
photographs  are  perfect  caricatures — every  one 
of  them.  They  give  no  idea  of  those  wonder- 
fully clear,  translucent,  great  blue  eyes,  with 
their  now  soft  and  melting  and  now  keen  and 
penetrating  glance;  of  her  fresh  and  fair  com- 
plexion, which  on  the  stage  is  hidden  under  a 
horrid  mask  of  thick  paint;  of  her  beautiful 
light  blond  hair,  which  lacks  just  a  shade  of 
being  golden  and  is  curled  in  the  most  graceful 
fashion ;  of  her  tender  and  sensitive  mouth,  the 
slightest  motion  of  which  is  full  of  character 
and  expression.  I  had  never  considered  her 
pretty.  I  now,  after  a  most  careful  and  pains- 
taking inspection,  decidedly  thought  her  so. 
She  was  charmingly  dressed,  too,  and  her  thin- 
ness of  person,  which  is  so  generally  marked, 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  31 

but  which  she  ridicules  herself,  was  most  artis- 
tically disguised.  The  waves  of  lace  and  ruffles 
which  fell  about  her  neck  appeared  to  hide  a 
bust  worthy  of  Diana  herself." 

Other  contemporary  accounts  show  that  those 
who  visited  her  at  her  studio  found  her  clad 
in  a  gray  or  white  flannel  suit  of  masculine  gar- 
ments,— jacket,  trousers,  necktie  and  all,  "  look- 
ing something  like  a  thirteen-year-old  boy." 
Though  Sarah  performed  wonders  in  the  way 
of  self-advertising,  more  than  one  observer  has 
noticed  that  she  had  a  certain  natural  dignity 
that  was  not  altogether  inconsistent  with  a 
rather  rollicking  playfulness.  "Her  words  are 
those  of  a  lady,"  wrote  one,  "and  her  enuncia- 
tion, though  rapid,  beautifully  distinct."  She 
has  always  been  eminently  hospitable. 

In  the  engaging  phrase  of  one  of  her  biogra- 
phers,30 "Marriage  was  the  only  eccentricity 
that  Sarah  had  not  yet  perpetrated."  In  the 
spring  of  1882  she  remedied  this  deficiency  by 
marrying  a  member  of  her  company,  a  Greek 
named  Damala,  or,  as  he  was  known  on  the  stage, 
Daria.  Sarah  had  been  proceeding  up  and 
down  Europe  (always  patriotically  excepting 
Germany),  playing  in  France,  Holland,  Bel- 
gium, Denmark,  Sweden,  Norway,  Russia,  Italy, 
Austria  and  Spain,  everywhere  with  immense 
success.31  In  the  midst  of  this  tour,  quite  un- 

30  Huret. 

si  A  dispatch  from  Moscow  represents  the  feeling  there: 
"Sarah  Bernhardt  is  extremely  hoarse  and  cannot  appear  this 
evening.  General  consternation  prevails."  She  finally  did 
act  in  Berlin,  in  1902. 


32        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

expectedly  (April,  1882),  came  the  announce- 
ment of  the  marriage.  In  order  to  have  the 
ceremony  performed  in  London,  she  had  trav- 
eled from  Naples,  and  then  returned  to  Spain 
to  resume  the  tour.32  It  was  the  talk  of  the  day 
that  the  reason  for  Sarah's  sudden  marriage 
and  for  the  selection  of  London  as  the  scene  of 
the  ceremony,  was  not  only  her  passing  infatua- 
tion for  Damala,  but  also  a  wish  to  propitiate 
English  Puritanism.  For  a  tour  of  England 
and  Scotland  soon  followed.  The  marriage  was 
not  a  huge  success,  however.  It  lasted  not 
more  than  a  year. 

The  mere  statement  of  Bernhardt's  wander- 
ings is  sufficiently  astonishing  and  is  one  proof 
of  her  wonderful  vitality.  In  1886,  a  tour  that 
lasted  more  than  a  year  took  her  to  Mexico, 
Brazil,  Chile,  the  Argentine,33  the  United  States 
and  Canada.  Two  years  later  she  acted  in  Con- 
stantinople, Cairo  and  Alexandria,  besides 
most  of  the  European  countries.  In  the  early 
part  of  1891  she  left  Europe  for  two  years  and 
played  not  only  in  North  and  South  America, 
but  this  time  as  far  afield  as  Australia.  Sarah 
has  been  a  cosmopolitan  figure,  if  there  ever 
was  one.  As  the  land  of  readily  won  dol- 
lars, the  United  States  has  naturally  been  much 
favored;  for  beginning  in  1880,  Bernhardt  has 

32  Sarah  Bernhardt's  son  Maurice  was  born  in  1865  and 
was,  therefore,  seventeen  at  the  time  of  his  mother's  mar- 
riage. 

ss  The  Argentines,  in  enthusiastic  but  ill-advised  generosity, 
presented  Sarah  with  an  estate  of  thirteen  thousand  acres.  As 
if  Sarah  could  feel  at  home  so  far  from  Paris! 


SARAH  BERNHAEDT  33 

made  no  less  than  nine  tours  in  America.34 
Like  a  number  of  actors  of  the  other  sex,  but 
almost  alone  among  actresses,  Bernhardt  has 
dabbled  in  the  management  of  theatres.  Soon 
after  her  first  American  tour,  she  assumed  con- 
trol of  the  Ambigu  in  Paris.  If  she  had  acted 
in  her  own  theatre  (as  later  she  did),  her  busi- 
ness venture  might  have  succeeded.  As  it  was, 
she  was  acting  Fedora  at  the  Vaudeville,  and 
later,  with  only  moderate  success,  in  Holland 

s*  Mme.  Bernhardt's  more  important  productions,  since  she 
became  a  manager  in  her  own  right,  have  been  as  follows: 
Fedora,  1882;  Nana  Sahib,  1883;  Macbeth,  Theodora,  1884; 
Marion  Delorme,  1885;  Hamlet  (Ophelia),  Le  Maitre  des 
Forges,  1886;  La  Tosco,  1887;  Francillon,  1888;  Lena,  1889; 
Jeanne  d'Arc,  Cleopdtre,  1890;  Pauline  Blanchard,  La  Dame 
de  Chalant,  1891;  Les  Rois,  1893;  Izeil,  Gismonda,  1894; 
Magda,  La  Princesse  Lointaine,  1895;  Lorenzaccio,  1896; 
Spiritisme,  La  Samaritaine,  Les  Mauvais  Bergers,  1897;  La 
Ville  Morte,  Lysiane,  Medee,  1898;  Hamlet,  1899;  L'Aiglon, 
1900;  Francesco,  da  Rimini,  1902;  Andromache,  1903;  La  Sor- 
ciere,  1904;  Tisbe,  Angelo,  1905;  La  Vierge  d'Avila,  1906;  Les 
Bouffons,  1907;  La  Belle  au  Bois  Dormant,  La  Courtisane  de 
Corinthe,  1908;  Le  Proces  de  Jeanne  d'Arc,  1909;  La  Femme  X, 
Judas,  Le  Coeur  d'Homme  (written  by  herself),  La  Beffa, 
1910;  La  Reine  Elisabeth,  Une  Nuit  de  Noel,  1912;  Jeanne 
Dore,  1913. 

To  the  plays  she  had  acted  during  the  first  American  tour, 
1880-81,  (see  page  28,  note)  she  added,  on  her  subsequent 
visits:  1887,  Fedora,  Le  Maitre  des  Forges,  Theodora;  1891, 
La  Tosca,  Cleopatra;  1891-92,  Jeanne  d'Arc,  La  Dame  de 
Chalant,  Pauline  Blanchard  Leah;  1896,  Izeil,  Magda,  Gis- 
monda, La  Femme  de  Claude;  1900-01,  (with  Coquelin) 
L'Aiglon,  Hamlet,  Cyrano  de  Bergerac;  1905-06,  La  Sorciere, 
Angelo,  Sapho,  Tisbe.  (During  the  tour  of  1905-06,  while 
acting  in  Texas  she  was  forced  on  two  or  three  occasions  to 
appear  in  a  circus  tent  in  lieu  of  a  theatre.  The  "theatrical 
trust"  had  for  some  reason  denied  her  the  privilege  of  acting 
in  its  theatres.)  In  1910-11  she  appeared,  for  the  first  time 
in  America,  in  La  Femme  X,  La  Samaritaine,  Jean-Mariet 
8o2ur  Beatrice,  and  Judas. 


34        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

and  Belgium.  The  Ambigu  languished.  In  the 
meantime,  Sarah  had  spent  all  her  money. 
Finding  herself  in  straits,  she  auctioned  her 
jewels,  and  realized  handsomely  on  them.  It 
was  an  event  in  Paris,  and  the  sale  produced 
no  less  than  thirty-five  thousand  dollars. 

Her  next  venture  in  management  was  more 
successful.  In  1883,  on  behalf  of  her  son,  she 
bought  a  partnership  in  the  Porte  St.  Martin, 
and  produced  Frou-Frou  there  for  the  first  time 
in  Paris.  Her  regime  at  this  house  was  inter- 
rupted by  the  long  tour  begun  in  1886,  but  con- 
tinued, under  the  prosperity  shed  by  her  own 
presence,  until  1893,  when  she  bought  the  Ren- 
aissance. Since  that  day  she  has  owned  her 
own  theatre,  until  1899  at  the  Renaissance,  and 
since  then  at  the  more  commodious  Theatre 
Sarah-Bernhardt,  her  renaming  of  the  Theatre 
des  Nations. 

When  Bernhardt  went  to  America  for  the 
first  time  she  had  in  her  company  an  actress 
named  Marie  Colombier.  For  reasons  that  are 
difficult  to  determine,  this  woman  conceived  a 
passionate  hatred  of  Sarah  and  on  her  return 
to  France  prepared,  or  had  prepared  for  her,35 
a  thinly  disguised  pseudo-biography  of  Bern- 
hardt which  sold  in  enormous  numbers  under 
the  name  Les  Memoires  de  Sarah  Barnum. 
This  pamphlet  subjected  Bernhardt  to  miscel- 

35  It  was  really  written,  gossip  said,  by  M.  Paul  Bonnetain. 
Sarah  replied  with  an  equally  abusive  book  about  Mile.  Co- 
lombier, which  was  entitled  La  Vie  de  Marie  Pigeonnier,  and 
which  was  probably  written  by  M.  Richepin. 


SARAH  BERNHAKDT  35 

laneons  ridicule  and  abuse.  Although  on  the 
whole  false,  parts  of  it  may  have  been  true 
enough  to  penetrate  the  armor  against  gossip 
that  Sarah  schooled  herself  to  wear.  At  any 
rate,  she  was  furiously  angry.  When  the  book 
had  been  in  circulation  long  enough  to  give  her 
action  its  proper  background  and  advertising 
value,  Bernhardt  one  day  turned  up  at  Mme. 
Colombier's  apartment,  accompanied  by  her  son 
and  M.  Jean  Eichepin,  and  armed  with  a  horse- 
whip. The  party  forced  themselves  in,  and 
Sarah,  great  actress,  proceeded  to  chase  her  de- 
tractor about  the  place,  beating  her  soundly 
with  the  whip.  A  similar  incident  occurred  at 
Rio  de  Janeiro  in  1886.  Mme.  Noirmont,  a 
member  of  the  company,  one  day  "went  for" 
Sarah  with  strong  language  and  the  flat  of  her 
hand.  Sarah  was  at  first  content  with  the 
woman's  arrest,  but  one  evening,  between  the 
acts,  her  desire  for  revenge  got  the  better  of 
her,  and  Mme.  Noirmont  was,  in  her  turn,  thor- 
oughly horsewhipped.  The  cause  of  these  (at 
the  time)  world  famous  ructions,  which  are  now 
important  only — if  at  all — as  shedding  light  on 
Sarah's  frail  humanity,  has  always  remained 
shrouded  in  mystery. 

Further  proof  that  the  "divine  Sarah"  was 
after  all  very  human  was  furnished  in  1907 
when  she  published  a  volume  of  reminiscences.36 
William  Winter's  estimate  of  this  book  is  char- 

3«  It  carries  her  story  down  to  her  return  from  the  first 
American  tour,  in  1881.  A  second  volume  was  vaguely 
promised. 


36        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

acteristic;  it  contains,  he  says:  "some  passages 
of  interest,  but,  as  a  whole,  it  is  diffuse,  flam- 
boyant, and  artificial, — an  eccentric  contribu- 
tion to  theatrical  annals,  mottled  over  by  affec- 
tation, egregious  vanity,  and  the  pervasive  in- 
sincerity of  an  inveterate  self-exploiter. ' '  It 
would  be  juster  to  say  that  the  book  shows  in 
many  places  a  more  likable  woman  than  the 
eccentric  celebrity  was  supposed  to  be,  and  that 
it  contains  but  few  passages  that  are  not  of  in- 
terest. At  any  rate,  it  shows  Sarah  to  be,  after 
all,  in  many  respects  like  us  commonplace 
people. 

Whatever  hostility  she  may  have  met  in  her 
earlier  days,  Bernhardt  long  ago  won  the  un- 
qualified homage  of  her  countrymen.  To  them 
she  became  a  cherished  national  institution,  the 
great  actress  of  her  time.  "The  great  and  only 
Sarah "  is  the  phrase  of  the  once  scoffing  Sar- 
cey.  "I  am  not  quite  sure,"  wrote  Lemaitre 
in  1894,  "whether  Mile.  Sarah  Bernhardt  can 
say  'How  do  you  do?'  like  any  ordinary  mortal. 
To  be  herself  she  must  be  extraordinary,  and 
then  she  is  incomparable. ' '  "  You  cannot  praise 
her  for  reciting  poetry  well,"  said  M.  Theodore 
de  Banville,  a  poet  learned  in  metres  and 
rhythms;  "she  is  the  muse  of  poetry  itself. 
A  secret  instinct  moves  her.  She  recites  poetry 
as  the  nightingale  sings,  as  the  wind  sighs,  and 
as  the  water  murmurs. ' ' 

"Her  acting  is  the  summit  of  art," — again 
Sarcey — "our  grandfathers  used  to  speak  with 
emotion  of  Talma  and  Mile.  Mars.  I  never  saw 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  37 

the  One  or  the  other,  and  I  have  barely 
any  recollection  of  Rachel,  but  I  do  not  believe 
that  anything  more  original  and  more  perfect 
than  Mile.  Sarah  Bernhardt's  Phedre  has  ever 
been  seen  in  any  theatre." 

To  take  this  view  of  Sarah  one  must,  perhaps, 
be  a  Frenchman.  The  Sarcey  of  America,  Wil- 
liam Winter,  certainly  could  not  take  it.  With 
what  may  be  termed  the  utilitarian  Puritanism 
that  seeks  in  the  theatre  to  be  "benefited, 
cheered,  encouraged,  ennobled,  instructed,  or 
even  rationally  entertained, "  he  could  see  in 
[Bernhardt's  art  only  an  exhibition  of  morbid 
eccentricity.  Mr.  Winter,  here  as  elsewhere, 
[has  been  made  intolerant  of  much  in  the  institu- 
tion he  has  served  and  honored  by  his  insistence 
on  "intrinsic  grandeur "  in  its  characters.  He 
is  always  looking  for  "the  woman  essentially 
good  and  noble/'  whereas  the  modern  drama 
has  as  one  of  its  most  cherished  prerogatives 
its  right  to  portray  mixed  characters, — often 
women  whose  "essential  goodness"  is  mingled 
with  much  human  frailty. 

Fairly  enough,  however,  according  to  his 
lights,  does  Mr.  Winter  specify  and  define  Bern- 
hardt's peculiar  merits:  "They  are,  in  brief, 
.the  ability  to  elicit  complete  and  decisive  dra- 
matic effect  from  situations  of  horror,  terror, 
passion,  and  mental  anguish;  neat- 
in  the  adjustment  of  manifold  details; 
evenly  sustained  continuity;  ability  to  show  a 
who  seeks  to  cause  physical  infatuation 
who  generally  can  succeed  in  doing  so;  a 


38        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

t 

woman  in  whom  vanity,  cruelty,  selfishness,  and 
animal  propensity  are  supreme;  a  woman  of 
formidable,  sometimes  dangerous,  sometimes 
terrible  mental  force." 

Not  all  of  Madame  Bernhardt's  impersona- 
tions, however,  fall  within  Mr.  Winter's  pro- 
scribed class.  She  has  at  times  shown  a  start- 
ling propensity  for  breaking  into  new  and 
strange  fields.  Her  Jeanne  d'Arc  (1890),  a 
genuine  success,  was  certainly  not  a  "  morbid 
eccentric."  "It  is  impossible  to  make  Hamlet 
Parisian,"  but,  in  1899,  Sarah  played  Hamlet, 
to  the  satisfaction  of  the  French  at  least. 
"She  never  did  anything  finer,"  said  Eostand. 
"She  makes  one  understand  Hamlet,  and  under- 
stand him  beyond  the  possibility  of  a  doubt."  37 
A  year  later  she  was  playing  Beichstadt,  the 
son  of  Napoleon,  in  L'Aiglon,  an  impersonation 
that  even  Mr.  Winter  admitted  "was  one  of 
beautiful  symmetry."  And  of  recent  years 
Sarah  has  threatened — though  as  yet  she  has  not 
accomplished — the  acting  of  Mephistopheles  in 
Faust. 

When  Bernhardt  was  in  London  in  1895, 
George  Bernard  Shaw  was  in  the  midst  of  his 
career  as  the  dramatic  critic  of  the  Saturday 
Review,  serving  a  three-year  term  of  what  he 
called  his  slavery  to  the  theatre.  He  observed 
Sarah  with  none  too  sympathetic  eyes,  but  what 

37  But  to  Mr.  Winter  her  Hamlet  was  a  "dreadful  desecra- 
tion"! When  she  produced  the  play  in  Paris,  the  late  M. 
Catulle  Mendes  and  another  journalist  fought  a  duel,  having 
disputed  as  to  whether  Hamlet  was  fat  or  not. 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  39 

he  said  shows,  under  his  purposefully  irritating 
exterior,  the  shrewd  critical  insight  that  makes 
the  " Dramatic  Opinions  and  Essays"  one  of  the 
soundest  books  of  theatrical  comment,  as  well 
as  one  of  the  most  readable : 

"Madame  Bernhardt  has  the  charm  of  a 
jolly  maturity,  rather  spoilt  and  petulant,  per- 
haps, but  always  ready  with  a  sunshine-through- 
the-clouds  smile  if  only  she  is  made  much  of. 
Her  dresses  and  diamonds,  if  not  exactly  splen- 
did, are  at  least  splendacious ;  her  figure,  far  too 
scantily  upholstered  in  the  old  days,  is  at  its 
best;  and  her  complexion  shows  that  she  has  not 
studied  modern  art  in  vain.  .  .  .  She  is  beauti- 
ful with  the  beauty  of  her  school,  and  entirely 
inhuman  and  incredible.  But  the  incredibility 
is  pardonable,  because,  though  it  is  all  the  great- 
est nonsense,  nobody  believing  in  it,  the  ac- 
tress herself  least  of  all,  it  is  so  artful,  so  clever, 
so  well  recognized  a  part  of  the  business,  and 
carried  off  with  such  a  genial  air,  that  it  is  im- 
possible not  to  accept  it  with  good-humor.  One 
feels,  when  the  heroine  bursts  on  the  scene,  a 
dazzling  vision  of  beauty,  that  instead  of  im- 
posing on  you,  she  adds  to  her  own  piquancy  by 
looking  you  straight  in  the  face,  and  saying,  in 
effect:  'Now  who  would  ever  suppose  that  I 
am  a  grandmother!'  That,  of  course,  is  ir- 
resistible; and  one  is  not  sorry  to  have  been 
coaxed  to  relax  one's  notions  of  the  dignity  of 
art  when  she  gets  to  serious  business  and  shows 
how  ably  she  does  her  work.  The  coaxing  suits 
well  with  the  childishly  egotistical  character  of 


40        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

her  acting,  winch  is  not  the  art  of  making  you 
think  more  highly  or  feel  more  deeply,  but  the 
art  of  making  you  admire  her,  pity  her,  cham- 
pion her,  weep  with  her,  laugh  at  her  jokes,  fol- 
low her  fortunes  breathlessly,  and  applaud  her 
wildly  when  the  curtain  falls.  It  is  the  art  of 
finding  out  all  your  weaknesses  and  practicing 
on  them — cajoling  you,  harrowing  you,  exciting 
you — on  the  whole,  fooling  you.  And  it  is  al- 
ways Sarah  Bernhardt  in  her  own  capacity  who 
does  this  to  you.  The  dress,  the  title  of  the 
play,  the  order  of  the  words  may  vary ;  but  the 
woman  is  always  the  same.  She  does  not  enter 
into  the  leading  character:  she  substitutes  her- 
self for  it" 

Where  a  more  tolerant  judgment  would  pro- 
claim Sarah 's  inalterable  romanticism,  Mr. 
Shaw,  whose  passion  for  truth  and  realism  leave 
him  little  room  for  the  sort  of  truth  and  reality 
there  may  be  in  the  romantic,  sees  only  the  tricks 
of  her  trade :  ' '  Every  year  Madame  Bernhardt 
comes  to  us  with  a  new  play,  in  which  she  kills 
somebody  with  any  weapon  from  a  hairpin  to  a 
hatchet ;  intones  a  great  deal  of  dialogue  as  a 
sample  of  what  is  called  'the  golden  voice/  to 
the  great  delight  of  our  curates,  who  all  produce 
more  or  less  golden  voices  by  exactly  the  same 
trick ;  goes  through  her  well-known  feat  of  tear- 
ing a  passion  to  tatters  at  the  end  of  the  second 
or  fourth  act,  according  to  the  length  of  the 
piece;  serves  out  a  ration  of  the  celebrated 
smile ;  and  between  whiles  gets  through  any  or- 
dinary acting  that  may  be  necessary  in  a  thor- 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  41 

oughly  businesslike  and  competent  fashion. 
This  routine  constitutes  a  permanent  exhibition, 
which  is  refurnished  every  year  with  fresh 
scenery,  fresh  dialogue,  and  a  fresh  author, 
whilst  remaining  itself  invariable.  Still,  there 
are  real  parts  in  Madame  Bernhardt's  repertory 
which  date  from  the  days  before  the  traveling 
show  was  opened;  and  she  is  far  too  clever  a 
woman,  and  too  well  endowed  with  stage  in- 
stinct, not  to  rise,  in  an  off-handed,  experimental 
sort  of  way,  to  the  more  obvious  points  in  such 
an  irresistible  new  part  as  Magda."  On  the 
whole,  Shaw  is  something  less  than  fair  to 
Sarah.  But  one  cannot  deny  him  an  apprecia- 
tive chortle  when  he  speaks  of  her  "  dragging 
from  sea  to  sea  her  Armada  of  transports. " 

On  December  9,  1896,  there  was  held  a  fete 
in  Paris  in  honor  of  Bernhardt — the  most  strik- 
ing in  a  long  line  of  similar  occasions.  It  was 
felt  that  her  position  as  queen  of  the  stage  de- 
served a  public  recognition.  It  was  carried 
through  with  Gallic  enthusiasm.  Sardou  pre- 
sided at  a  mid-day  banquet  attended  by  Coppee, 
Lemaitre,  Theuriet,  Lavedan,  Coquelin,  Char- 
pentier,  Eostand,  and  a  host  of  others  from  the 
literary  and  artistic  world  of  Paris.  Sardou 
hailed  her  as  the  acknowledged  sovereign  of 
dramatic  art,  and  bore  testimony  not  only  to 
her  acting,  but  also  to  "the  benevolence,  the 
charity,  and  the  exquisite  kindness  of  the 
woman."  When  Sarah  had  responded  with  a 
few  words  of  thanks,  there  was  a  great  demon- 
stration, emotionally  enthusiastic  and  Gallic. 


42        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Later  in  the  day,  at  the  Renaissance,  the  cere- 
monies were  continued.  Sarah  gave  the  third 
act  of  Phedre  and  the  fourth  act  of  Rome  Vain- 
cue.  She  gave  her  best  efforts  and  her  hearers 
were  much  moved.  Huret  records  that  all  his 
neighbors  in  the  audience  were  weeping.  Then, 
five  poets,  Francois  Coppee,  Edmond  Haran- 
court,  Catulle  Mendes,  Andre  Theuriet  and  Ed- 
mond Rostand,  advanced  in  turn,  each  to  read 
a  sonnet  in  Sarah's  honor.  When  Rostand's — 
the  last  and  best — was  finished,  she  was  seen  to 
tremble  and  to  stand  weeping  in  their  midst. 
"No  spectacle  could  be  finer,"  says  Huret, 
"than  this  woman,  whose  unconquerable  energy 
had  withstood  the  struggles  and  difficulties  of  a 
thirty-years'  career,  standing  overwhelmed  and 
vanquished  by  the  power  of  a  few  lines  of 
poetry." 

Whether  or  not  she  was  a  divinely  ennobled 
and  beneficent  artist,  this  trait  of  "unconquer- 
able energy"  is  undeniably  a  marvel.  For  in- 
stance, in  January,  1906,  when  she  was  sixty- 
one,  she  appeared  in  Boston.  In  the  twenty- 
six  hours  between  half-past  eight  on  Friday 
evening  and  half -past  ten  on  Saturday  evening 
she  acted  Fedora,  Phedre,  and  Cesarine  in 
Dumas 's  La  Femme  de  Claude,  each  a  long, 
exacting  and,  one  would  think,  exhausting  role. 
At  the  end  of  the  third  play,  however,  Bern- 
hardt  had  her  artistic  resources  and  her 
strength  as  fully  under  her  command  as  at  the 
beginning.  And  she  had  been  forty-four  years 
on  the  stage.  This  was  but  an  incident  of  a 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  43 

widely  extended  tour,  a  sample  of  what  she  had 
been  doing  all  her  life. 

In  February,  1907,  she  was  made  a  professor 
at  the  Conservatoire,  partly  in  an  attempt  to 
make  her  eligible  for  the  cross  of  the  Legion  of 
Honor.  This  was  an  honor  that  Sarah  had  long 
desired,  and,  it  must  be  said,  deserved.  Her 
service  to  her  country  as  a  herald  of  its  language 
and  art — to  say  nothing  of  that  during  1870 — 
has  been  inestimably  greater  than  that  of  many 
who  have  received  the  honor.  But  in  France  an 
actress  is  still  without  social  position,  and  the 
social  conservatism  of  Paris  officialdom  always 
prevailed  in  the  face  of  Sarah's  champions. 
For  no  actress,  merely  as  an  actress,  had  ever 
been  admitted  to  the  Legion.  In  January,  1914, 
however,  it  was  announced  throughout  the  world 
that  Mme.  Bernhardt  had  received  the  long-cov- 
eted decoration.  The  usual  objections  and 
traditions  had  been  interposed,  but  President 
Poincaire  himself  cut  the  red  tape.  In  March 
the  formal  presentation  occurred.  L'Univer- 
site  des  Annales  organized  the  ceremony.  Gov- 
ernment officials,  actors  and  actresses,  poets, 
playwrights  and  a  throng  of  the  notabilities 
of  Paris  gathered  to  do  Madame  Sarah  honor. 
The  Minister  of  Fine  Arts,  on  behalf  of  the 
Government,  presented  the  decoration  and 
made  a  formal  speech  in  which  he  summed  up 
her  services  as  patriot  and  as  a  missionary  of 
the  French  language.  Verses  by  Kostand  and 
other  poets  were  read,  music  composed  for  the 
occasion  was  played,  artists  advanced  and 


44        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

heaped  flowers  at  Bernhardt 's  feet,  and  then 
came  forward  twelve  actors  and  actresses,  each 
representing  a  famous  character  in  Bern- 
hardt's  repertoire,  and  speaking  lines  from 
the  original  plays.  The  whole  became  a  son- 
net in  dialogue.  Finally  Bernhardt  herself 
ended  the  very  French  but  very  sincere  occa- 
sion by  an  eloquent  and  tender  speech  of  thanks. 

About  this  time  a  photograph  found  its 
way  into  the  American  newspapers.  It  showed 
Madame  Sarah  with  the  glittering  cross  of  the 
Legion  pinned  to  her  dress.  Seated  on  her  lap 
and  gazing  at  the  decoration  is  Madame  Sarah 's 
great- grandchild. 

We  have  mentioned  Mr.  Winter's  wholesale 
repudiation  of  the  plays  in  which  Bernhardt  at- 
tained her  eminence.  Without  subscribing  to 
the  total  depravity  of  such  plays  and  of  Bern- 
hardt 's  influence,  one  can  freely  admit  that  her 
appeal  fell  below  the  supremest  heights  of 
drama,  and  that  her  field  was,  after  all,  a  nar- 
row one.  There  were  natural  causes  for  this 
narrowness.  It  was  imposed  by  her  person- 
ality. She  partakes  to  the  fullest  extent  of  that 
variation  of  the  French  character  that  is  pre- 
dominatingly sensual,  yet  regards  its  sensuality 
as  a  kind  of  spirituality.  Again,  her  tech- 
nical equipment  as  an  actress  included  a  voice 
of  such  richness  and  variety  of  effect,  and  a 
power  of  gesture  and  pose  so  naturally  adapted 
to  the  grand  style,  that  her  tendency  was  for 
the  florid  and  rhetorical.  Thus  the  idealistic  or 
poetic  play,  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  frankly 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  45 

naturalistic  on  the  other,  were  beyond  her  prov- 
ince. The  result  has  been,  most  notably,  a  suc- 
cession of  plays  by  Sardou — Fedora,  Theodora, 
La  Tosca,  Cleopatre,  Gismonda,  Zoraya,  in 
which  the  author  "accepting  her  limitations, 
harped  time  and  time  again  upon  the  same 
notes.  His  heroines  are  creatures  all  alike  com- 
pounded of  Bernhardtesque  attributes — feline 
in  their  endearments,  tigerish  in  their  passions 
of  love  and  hate.  As  stage  figures  they  repre- 
sent the  boldest  prose  of  the  emotions,  ex- 
pressed with  a  rhetoric  that  is  flawless,  but  still 
rhetoric."38 

So  much  for  the  main  note.  In  a  career  so 
astonishingly  long  and  successful  there  have 
been,  of  course,  others.  We  have  seen  how,  in 

ss  John  Corbin  in  the  New  York  Sun,  Dec.  17,  1905.  A 
quarter  of  a  century  earlier,  Matthew  Arnold  had  written  of 
Bernhardt,  then  in  the  midst  of  her  first  visit  to  London: 
"One  remark  I  will  make,  a  remark  suggested  by  the  in- 
evitable comparison  of  Mile.  Sarah  Bernhardt  with  Rachel. 
One  talks  vaguely  of  genius,  but  I  had  never  till  now  com- 
prehended how  much  of  Rachel's  superiority  was  purely  in 
intellectual  power,  how  eminently  this  power  counts  in  the 
actor's  art  as  in  all  art,  how  just  is  the  instinct  which  led 
the  Greeks  to  mark  with  a  high  and  severe  stamp  the  Muses. 
Temperament  and  quick  intelligence,  passion,  nervous  mo- 
bility, grace,  smile,  voice,  charm,  poetry — Mile.  Sarah  Bern- 
hardt has  them  all;  one  watches  her  with  pleasure,  with  ad- 
miration, and  yet  not  without  a  secret  disquietude.  Some- 
thing is  wanting,  or,  at  least,  not  present  in  sufficient  force; 
something  which  alone  can  secure  and  fix  her  administration 
of  all  the  charming  gifts  which  she  has,  can  alone  keep  them 
fresh,  keep  them  sincere,  save  them  from  perils  by  caprice, 
perils  by  mannerism;  that  something  is  high  intellectual 
power.  It  was  here  that  Rachel  was  so  great;  she  began,  one 
says  to  oneself,  as  one  recalls  her  image  and  dwells  upon  it — 
she  began  almost  where  Mile.  Sarah  Bernhardt  ends." 


46        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

L'Aiglon,  Hamlet,  and  Jeanne  d'Arc  she  boldly 
went  outside  her  usual  field.  Even  within  it 
there  have  been  of  course  many  moments  of 
winning  appeal  or  great  power.  To  none  other 
than  Mr.  Winter  did  her  Frou-Frou  appear 
pure-spirited,  "an  exquisite  texture  ...  of 
child-like  womanhood,"39  and  as  Floria  Tosca 
"Bernhardt's  acting  .  .  .  was  magnificent, — 
for  it  created  the  effect  of  perfect  illusion"; 
it  will  "be  remembered  with  a  shuddering 
sense  of  horror  as  long  as  anything  is  re- 
membered of  her  achievement.  ...  Of  its  kind 
it  was  absolutely  perfect  art."  In  La  Femme 
X  he  found  her  art  consummate.  Her  Mar- 
guerite Gauthier  in  La  Dame  aux  Camelias  did 
much  to  give  that  heroine  genuine  and  compel- 
ling appeal  to  the  purer  emotions,  her  Phedre 
has  its  moments  of  genuine  nobility.  And 
though  it  may  be  true  that,  in  the  main,  she 
worked  in  those  strata  of  the  drama  that  are  of 
"little  benefit  to  humanity,"  the  sheer  extent 
and  strength  of  her  influence  bear  witness  that 
much  in  her  work  found  a  response  in  the  minds 
and  sympathies  of  two  generations  of  people. 

She  is,  after  all,  unique,  whatever  the  lofti- 
ness of  her  message;  for  the  intensity  of  her 

39  "Her  fiery,  voluble  utterance  of  jealous  rage  when  at  last 
she  seemed  to  lose  all  control  of  herself  (without  ever  losing 
it)  ...  was  as  splendid,  whether  viewed  as  expression  of 
human  nature  or  illustration  of  proficiency  in  acting,  as  any 
professional  exploit  of  hers  in  the  whole  of  her  long  career. 
...  It  was  in  her  showing  of  the  sweetly  capricious  quality 
of  the  character,  however,  that  the  actress  was  supremely 
fine."  The  Wallet  of  Time,  Vol.  I. 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  47 

power,  the  span  of  time  over  which  she  has  ex- 
ercised it  and  the  universality  of  her  fame  com- 
bine to  write  a  chapter  that  stands  alone  in 
theatrical  annals. 


To  the  body  of  Bernhardtian  legend  has  now 
been  added  the  legend  of  the  leg.  This  time  it 
is  an  authentic  legend,  and  one  that  adds 
greatly  to  Sarah's  merited  fame  for  courage 
and  will. 

In  February,  1915,  she  wrote  to  Mme.  Jane 
Catulle  Mendes: 

"My  Dear:  As  you  perhaps  have  learned, 
they  are  going  to  cut  off  my  leg  Monday.  They 
should  have  done  so  last  Sunday,  but  it  seems  I 
was  not  sufficiently  prepared  for  that  first  per- 
formance. The  principal  artist,  my  right  leg, 
had  not  learned  its  role.  It  has  now  learned  it, 
and  it  will  be  charming." 

There  is  a  long  story  of  patiently  endured 
suffering  back  of  that  lightly  phrased  note. 
In  1912  she  made  a  visit  to  America,  playing — 
as  before  and  since  in  London — in  the  vaude- 
ville theatres  short  scenes  from  her  former  suc- 
cesses. There  were  circumstances  in  her  acting 
that  puzzled  the  beholders.  She  would  take  a 
fixed  position  and  maintain  it  for  long  periods. 
When  she  moved  across  the  stage,  it  was  usually 
with  another's  support.  Such  hamperings  to 
her  acting  were  commonly  put  down  to  her 
advanced  age,  or  sometimes  to  rheumatism. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  Sarah  had  for  ten  years 


48        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

suffered  from  osteoarthritis — chronic  inflamma- 
tion of  the  articulation  of  her  right  knee.  The 
trouble  manifested  itself  first  at  Montevideo, 
and  was  there  temporarily  and  inadequately 
treated.  From  that  time,  at  first  intermittently 
.and  then  continuously,  the  knee  brought  her 
pain  that  she  endured  with  fortitude  and  with- 
out curtailment  of  her  work.  As  time  went  on, 
;she  gradually  modified  the  business  of  her  parts, 
-and  even  had  plays  written  to  suit  her  limita- 
tions,— as  in  Le  Proces  de  Jeanne  d'Arc,  in 
which  she  stood  in  court  all  during  one  act  and 
in  another  remained  seated  at  the  side  of  her 
bed. 

In  the  Spring  of  1914,  while  she  was  playing 
In  Liege,  she  gave  the  afflicted  knee  a  slight 
sprain.  Upon  this,  the  trouble  became  acute. 
She  remained,  first  at  her  house  on  Belle  Isle, 
and  later  at  Andernos,  now  Arcachon,  with  the 
knee  in  a  fixed  plaster  cast.  The  pain  was  re- 
duced ;  Mme.  Sarah  could  paint  and  could  work 
on  her  memoirs,  and  her  general  health  was  ex- 
cellent; but  here  she  was  with  her  career  cut 
off !  When  the  surgeons,  hoping  to  replace  the 
cast  with  some  apparatus  that  would  permit 
her  to  walk,  found  that  instead  the  knee  would 
lave  to  be  kept  unmoved  for  an  indefinite  time, 
Sarah  took  matters  into  her  own  hands,  and  or- 
dered the  offending  member  removed.  It  was 
better,  she  said,  in  a  letter  to  Maurice  Barres, 
"to  be  mutilated  than  to  remain  impotent. " 

On  February  22,  1915,  at  Bordeaux,  in  her 
seventy-first  year,  Mme.  Bernhardt's  right  leg 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  49 

was  amputated  above  the  knee.  "  While  the 
hospital  attendants  were  preparing  for  the  op- 
eration," said  a  dispatch  from  her  bedside, 
"the  actress  conversed  volubly  with  her  doc- 
tors: 'Work  is  my  life.  So  soon  as  I  can  be 
fitted  with  an  artificial  leg,  I  shall  resume  the 
stage  and  all  my  good  spirits  shall  be  restored. 
I  hope  again  to  be  able  to  use  all  that  force  of 
art  which  now  upholds  me  and  which  will  sus- 
tain me  until  beyond  the  grave,'  " — a  speech,  as 
Philip  Hale  said,  "worthy  of  one  of  Plutarch's 
men."  Surgeons  and  nurses  present  at  the  op- 
eration were  deeply  impressed  by  the  calm  cour- 
age with  which  she  faced  the  operation.40 

Even  in  the  midst  of  the  horrors  and  anxie- 
ties of  universal  war,  Bernhardt's  ordeal  chal- 
lenged world-wide  sympathy.  Portraits  and 
eulogies  appeared  in  every  paper.  For  a  week 
or  more,  until  it  became  certain  that  the  opera- 
tion had  been  successful,  bulletins  on  her  condi- 
tion were  printed  daily.  Queen  Victoria  of 
Spain,  the  aged  Eugenie,  M.  Deschanel,  presi- 
dent of  the  Chamber  of  Deputies,  Edmond 
Rostand — these  were  only  a  few  of  those,  both 
proud  and  humble,  whose  messages  poured  in 
upon  her  from  all  quarters.  Alexandra,  Queen- 
mother  of  Great  Britain,  sent  word  of  the 
"sympathy  which  all  England  shares  for  the 
greatest  artist  in  the  world."  After  the  opera- 

40  When  the  American  comedienne,  Elsie  Janis,  omitted 
from  her  London  program  her  imitation  of  Bernhardt,  Sarah 
heard  of  it  and  cabled  to  Miss  Janis:  "I  am  very  well. 
Continue  to  charm  the  public  with  imitations  of  me." 


50        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

tion,  Mme.  Bernhardt  said  that  she  was  to  "live 
again.  Already  I  am  free  from  suffering, 
happy  and  full  of  courage,  and  now  I  am  going 
to  get  well  quickly.  I  shall  retake  my  place  in 
the  wo  rid. " 

This  announcement  was  sufficiently  astound- 
ing. The  remarkable  woman  then  followed  it 
with  another, — that  she  would  make  a  new  tour 
in  America,  this  time  not  in  the  vaudeville 
theatres  (where  interest  in  her  was  before  not 
overwhelming),  but  in  the  regular  theatres, 
where  she  would  offer  a  number  of  plays  in 
which  she  has  not  yet  been  seen  on  this  side  of 
the  Atlantic. 

Thus  does  Bernhardt  remain  vividly  alive  to 
the  last.  M.  Jules  Lemaitre  once  said  that  he 
admired  her  because  of  the  unknown  he  felt 
to  be  in  her.  "She  might  go  into  a  nunnery, 
discover  the  North  Pole,  be  inoculated  with 
rabies,  assassinate  an  emperor,  or  marry  a 
negro  king,  and  I  should  never  be  surprised  at 
anything  she  did.  She  is  more  alive  and  more 
incomprehensible  by  herself  than  a  thousand 
other  human  beings.*' 

Thus  it  may  be  that  she  will  again  rally  about 
her  on  the  stage  of  Paris  the  loyal  affection  that 
went  out  to  her  in  the  hospital.  It  is  an  open 
secret  that  for  half  a  dozen  years  the  allegiance 
of  her  Paris  public  has  not  always  been  un- 
flagging. She  is  indubitably  old,  and  her  afflic- 
tion was  imperfectly  understood.  And  yet, 
when  her  latest  play,  Jeanne  Dore,  by  Tristan 
Bernard,  was  produced  in  December,  1913,  a 


SARAH  BERNHARDT  51 

flash  of  the  old  enthusiasm  broke  out  again  and 
one  correspondent  described  the  occasion  as 
"easily  the  most  brilliant  first  night  of  the 
Paris  season  so  far."  The  part,  moreover, 
was  an  exacting  emotional  one.  In  it  Madame 
Sarah  seems  again  to  have  shown  her  great 
power. 


HELENA  MODJESKA 

THE  acting  of  Madame  Modjeska  is  still 
remembered  vividly  by  American  and 
English  theatregoers,  yet  its  beginnings  lie  as 
far  away  in  time  as  the  sixties  and  as  distant 
in  place  as  Poland.  She  was  born  on  October 
12,  1840,  in  Cracow,  the  old  Polish  capital,  now 
the  second  city  of  Galitzia,  or  Austrian  Poland. 
Twenty-five  years  before,  by  the  agreement  of 
Bussia,  Prussia,  and  Austria,  it  had  been  pro- 
claimed a  free  city.  In  the  year  when  Mod- 
jeska was  six,  however,  Austria,  greedy  then  as 
now,  broke  her  pledge  and  annexed  the  city. 
The  Poles  were  always  a  passionately  patriotic 
people,  and  did  not  submit  calmly.  Discontent 
grew  to  open  revolt,  but  the  hopes  of  the  Cra- 
covians  were  crushed  by  the  bombardment  of 
the  city  by  the  Austrians  in  1848. 

Thus  the  little  Helcia1  was  born  in  tragic 
times,  and  as  a  little  girl  saw  scenes  of  terror 
and  bloodshed.  Her  mother's  house  was  struck 
by  the  cannon  shot,  and  she  saw  men  and  chil- 
dren killed  before  her  very  door.  The  horrors 
of  those  days  were  vividly  impressed  upon  her 
memory  and  were  perhaps  not  without  their 
effect  upon  the  nature  of  the  future  actress. 

Her  father,  Michael  Opid,  born  in  the  Car- 

i  The  Polish  diminutive  of  Helena. 
52 


HELENA   MODJESKA 


HELENA  MODJESKA  53 

pathian  mountains,  and  a  teacher  in  the  high 
school  in  Cracow,  was  a  simple-hearted,  lovable 
man,  something  of  a  scholar  and  a  great  lover 
of  music.  He  was  extremely  fond  of  children. 
His  own  girls  and  boys  and  those  of  his  neigh- 
bors would  gather  about  him  in  the  evening, 
listening  to  the  folk  lore  of  the  mountaineers, 
Polish  legends,  and  tales  from  the  Iliad. 
When  Helcia,  years  later,  herself  studied 
Homer,  those  winter  evenings  and  their  stories 
were  vividly  recalled.  But  Michael  Opid's 
chief  delight  was  music.  He  played  several 
instruments,  the  flute  especially  well.  His 
melodies  appealed  almost  too  strongly  to  the 
sensitive  little  Helcia,  who  during  plaintive 
passages  in  the  music  would  burst  into  wails 
and  cries.  Singers  and  musicians  were  fre- 
quent visitors  at  the  Opid  house,  and  in  its 
atmosphere  there  was  thus  an  artistic  element, 
which  undoubtedly  had  some  influence  in  de- 
termining the  career  of  Helcia.  Her  father 
died  when  she  was  seven,  of  consumption,  in- 
duced by  exposure  while  seeking  his  drowned 
brother's  body.  When  he  knew  he  was  dan- 
gerously ill,  he  returned  to  his  native  moun- 
tains to  die. 

It  had  been  the  second  marriage  of  Madame 
Opid.  She  had  been  Madame  Benda,  and  hav- 
ing altogether  ten  children  to  care  for,  she 
could  give  by  no  means  exclusive  attention  to 
any  one  of  them,  even  had  she  known  that  that 
one  was  to  be  a  great  actress.  The  children 
were  well  cared  for  so  far  as  their  bodily  wants 


54      HEROINES  OP  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

were  concerned,  but  their  personalities  were 
left  to  themselves  to  develop.  For  Helcia  this 
was  not  altogether  unfortunate,  for  her  im- 
agination, stirred  by  history-making  events 
and  by  the  songs  and  poems  of  which  she  was 
so  fond,  had  free  rein.  She  did  not  care  much 
for  the  society  of  other  children,  and  was  not 
popular  with  them.  She  was  a  little  dreamer, 
almost  painfully  bashful,  living  much  in  a 
world  of  her  imagination,  and  fond  of  going  to 
church.  She  would  steal  away  alone  to  the 
Dominican  chapel,  where  she  would  lie  face 
down  on  the  floor,  in  the  manner  of  the  peasant 
women,  arms  outstretched,  kissing  the  floor  and 
praying  for  a  miracle  or  a  glimpse  of  an  angel 
or  a  saint. 

Her  first  schooling  was  in  the  house  of  a 
friend  of  her  mother 's,  a  woman  with  two  well- 
educated  daughters  who  taught  the  little  Helcia, 
by  the  time  she  was  seven,  to  read  with  ease. 
She  fed  her  imagination  with  all  the  books  she 
could  find  at  hand.  In  school  she  liked  her 
Polish  history,  her  French  and  her  grammar. 

When  Helcia  was  seven,  she  was  taken  to  the 
theatre  for  the  first  time.  The  play  was  The 
Daughter  of  the  Regiment,  and  was  followed  by 
a  ballet  The  Siren  of  Dniestr,  in  which  little 
Josephine  Hofmann  (to  be  Josef  Hofmann's 
aunt)  dressed  as  a  butterfly,  hovered  about  in 
the  air.  Helcia  was  entranced ;  to  her  it  was  all 
a  dream  of  joy  come  true.2  She  went  to  bed 

2  "She  went  into  the  kitchen  when  she  got  home,  in  order  to 
make  the  experiment  herself.  She  built  a  great  pile  of  all  the 


HELENA  MODJESKA  55 

that  night  with  a  high  fever,  and  for  weeks 
afterward  she  practiced  the  butterfly  dance, 
watching  her  shadow  on  the  wall,  much  to  the 
amusement  of  her  small  brothers.  But  theat- 
ricals became  the  family  pastime.  Helcia 's 
three  older  brothers  were  enthusiastic.  They 
rigged  up  a  stage  at  home,  with  the  help  of  some 
other  boys  formed  a  little  company,  and  every 
month  gave  performances  for  admiring  friends. 
They  excluded  the  girls,  and  played  all  the 
women's  parts  themselves.  The  home  theatre 
was  probably  of  great  influence  in  the  lives  of 
its  members,  for  two  of  the  boys,  besides  Helcia 
and  her  sister,  subsequently  went  on  the  stage. 
In  1850,  when  Helcia  was  in  her  tenth  year, 
Cracow  was  burned.  The  conflagration  lasted 
ten  days,  and  a  large  part  of  the  city  was  de- 
stroyed. Madame  Opid  up  to  this  time  had 
been  a  woman  of  some  property.  Her  first 
husband  had  left  her  a  small  estate  which  she 
had  managed  skillfully.  Her  two  houses  were 
now  destroyed,  her  insurance  had  lapsed  ten 
days  before,  and  she  was  practically  ruined. 
Here  was  more  misfortune  to  impress  the  grow- 
ing Helcia,  to  make  her,  for  her  years,  unusually 
sensitive  and  thoughtful.  After  a  few  days  of 
almost  vagabondage,  the  family  was  given 
temporary  quarters  in  a  friend's  house.  There 
Helcia,  left  much  to  herself,  spent  her  time 

saucepans  and  frying-pans,  and  then,  climbing  to  the  top,  tried 
to  stand  there  upon  one  toe.  Naturally  this  venture  ended  in 
disaster;  and  Madame  Opid  vowed  Helcia  should  go  no  more 
to  the  theatre,  for  it  excited  her  too  much.  Nor  did  she  again 
enter  a  theatre  until  she  was  fourteen." — Collins,  Modjeska. 


56      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

reading  her  Life  of  St.  Genevieve,  a  treasured 
volume  which  she  rescued  in  the  moment  of 
peril.  At  length  installed  in  a  newly  hired 
house,  Madame  Opid  sent  Helcia  and  her  little 
sister  Josephine  as  day  pupils  to  St.  John's 
convent,  and  supplemented  the  teachings  of  the 
sisters  with  lessons  at  home  in  music  and  danc- 
ing. 

It  was  at  this  time,  when  Helena  was  ten, 
that  she  first  met  Gustave  Modrzejewski,3  who 
was  later  to  be  her  husband.  He  was  twenty 
years  her  senior.  He  was  a  friend  of  the  fam- 
ily and  taught  the  children  German,  the  hated 
language  of  the  oppressor. 

When  Helena  was  twelve,  her  half-brothers 
Joseph  and  Felix  Benda  had  gone  away  to  be 
actors  on  the  professional  stage.  To  relieve 
the  quiet  at  home  she  and  her  brother  Adolphe 
Opid,  who  was  then  fifteen,  wrote  a  play,  a  one- 
act  tragedy.  The  scene  was  laid  in  Greece,  and 
the  acting  required  the  death  of  Adolphe,  and  an 
impassioned  scene  of  grief  by  Helena  when 
with  a  sob  she  threw  herself  over  her  dead 
lover's  body.  She  drew  from  the  sympathetic 
servants  and  her  great-aunt  Theresa  genuine 
tears,  but  her  practical  mother  was  unmoved, 
thought  Helena  over-excited  and  forbade  fur- 
ther theatricals. 

At  fourteen  Helena  finished  the  highest  grade 
at  the  convent.  This  was  the  end  of  her  for- 
mal schooling,  but  she  at  once  began  a  strenu- 

s  The  masculine  form.  The  feminine  ends  in  -ska.  Madame 
Modrzejewska  later  simplified  the  name  to  Modjeska. 


HELENA  MODJESKA  57 

ous  and  varied  course  of  reading.  She  began 
with  the  Polish  poets,  of  whom  there  are  sev- 
eral proudly  cherished  by  their  countrymen. 
It  was  the  family's  pleasant  custom,  fostered 
by  the  well-read  Mr.  Modrzejewski,  to  read 
aloud  in  the  winter  evenings.  In  this  way 
Helena  learned  of  Scott,  Dickens,  Dumas, 
George  Sand,  and  many  another.  She  had 
neglected  her  German,  and  it  was  to  stimulate 
an  interest  in  the  disliked  language  that  Mr. 
Modrzejewski  proposed  that  she  be  taken  to 
see  a  German  play.  She  was  immensely  ex- 
cited, for  it  was  seven  years  since  she  had  been 
to  the  theatre.  The  play  was  Schiller's 
Kabale  und  Liebe.  She  entered  the  theatre  in 
a  state  of  awe,  she  sat  through  the  performance 
in  spellbound  fascination,  and  the  next  morn- 
ing with  the  help  of  a  dictionary  began  reading 
Schiller  in  German.  Schiller  became  for  the 
time  an  overwhelming  enthusiasm  with  her. 
She  imagined  herself  in  love  with  him,  and 
placed  before  her  in  her  room  his  statuette,  as 
a  kind  of  idol.  Such  extravagances  as  this,  and 
the  religious  period  that  preceded  it,  would 
have  indicated  to  a  discerning  eye  a  promis- 
ingly responsive  and  emotional  nature.  To 
those  about  her,  however,  even  to  her  mother, 
she  was  only  a  moody  and  at  times  excitable 
child  whose  enthusiasm  was  to  be  repressed 
and  whose  future  was  doubtful.  She  helped 
with  the  family  work,  as  all  did  in  this  time 
of  stress,  but  she  was  living  apart  in  a  world  of 
poetry,  of  vague  and  ardent  dreams. 


58      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

She  was  now  taken  to  the  theatre  occasion- 
ally. Felix  Benda  had  become  one  of  the  pop- 
ular actors  of  the  local  theatre.  One  day, 
when  Helena  was  about  sixteen,  he  overheard 
her  reciting  to  her  sister.  Surprised  and 
pleased,  he  took  her  next  day  to  the  house  of 
one  of  the  leading  actresses  of  the  company, 
who  as  an  artist  of  experience  could  judge  of 
the  young  girl's  chances  of  success  on  the  stage. 
All  this  came  very  suddenly.  Helena  had  not 
seriously  thought  of  a  stage  career.  The  hear- 
ing was  a  trying  ordeal,  for  she  was  terribly 
frightened.  After  giving  Helena  a  lesson  or 
two,  the  actress  was  discouraging.  She  ad- 
vised Madame  Opid  to  keep  the  young  girl  at 
home  rather  than  allow  her  to  become  a  medi- 
ocre actress.  For  a  while  Helcia's  budding  am- 
bitions were  crushed. 

Madame  Opid,  for  one,  was  not  disappointed. 
The  family  was  not  so  well  off  as  it  was  before 
the  fire  and  to  Helcia  fell  a  large  share  of  the 
housework.  But  she  studied  and  read  and 
thought,  with  unsettled  mind  and  changing  pur- 
pose. At  one  time  she  thought  she  would  try 
to  achieve  fame  as  a  writer;  again,  at  her 
mother's  wish,  she  studied  furiously  with  a 
teacher's  examination  in  mind;  again,  to  be- 
come a  nun  seemed  the  only  thing  worth  while. 
But  shortly  there  came  a  rude  shock  to  all  these 
plans.  Fritz  Devrient,  a  German  actor  of 
great  talent,  played  Hamlet  in  Cracow,  and 
Helena  was  taken  to  see  him.  She  had  heard  of 
Shakespeare,  but  had  never  seen  or  read  any 


HELENA  MODJESKA  59 

of  his  plays.  The  effect  on  her  was  overwhelm- 
ing. Shakespeare  became  her  master  then  and 
there,  and  she  never  deserted  him.  She  spent 
a  sleepless  night,  and  the  longing  to  be  an  act- 
ress returned  with  redoubled  strength.  She 
greedily  read  the  plays  of  Shakespeare  in  Po- 
lish translations,  and  his  bust  speedily  replaced 
that  of  Schiller.  The  family  friend,  Gustave 
Modrzejewski,  to  her  great  delight  seconded 
her  in  her  renewed  ambition,  recommended  that 
she  study  for  the  German  stage  as  offering  a 
wider  field  than  the  Polish,  and  arranged  for 
lessons  from  an  excellent  actor,  Herr  Axtman. 
Indeed,  his  interest  extended  further,  for  when 
Helcia  was  seventeen  he  urged  that  their  mar- 
riage, which  had  come  to  be  an  understood 
thing,  take  place  at  once.  She  had  seen  much 
of  him ;  they  had  read  together  Goethe  and  Less- 
ing  and  the  northern  sagas ;  he  was  her  guard- 
ian and  the  kindly  counselor  of  the  family ;  and 
she  looked  on  him,  a  man  more  than  twice  her 
age,  with  real  affection ;  and  so  they  were  mar- 
ried at  once. 

After  Helena  had  taken  the  name  which  she 
was  to  make  so  famous,  there  followed  a  few 
quiet  years  during  which  her  ambitions  lay  in 
abeyance.  When  she  was  twenty  her  son  Eu- 
dolphe  was  born.  The  little  family,  and  Ma- 
dame Opid  as  well,  moved  to  Bochnia,  a  little 
town  in  Austrian  Poland.  Here  it  was  that, 
owing  to  the  circumstance  that  Bochnia  pos- 
sessed salt  mines,  Mme.  Modjeska  had  her  first 
opportunity  to  appear  on  a  real  stage.  Some 


60      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

of  the  miners  had  been  killed  in  an  accident.  It 
occurred  to  the  Modjeskis  to  give,  for  the  bene- 
fit of  the  bereaved  families,  some  amateur  theat- 
ricals. They  met  a  friend,  a  dancing  master 
named  Loboiko,  who  obtained  a  hall,  hastily 
built  some  scenery  and  acted  as  leading  man 
of  the  company.  There  were  but  three  others 
— a  young  man  who  was  the  dancing  master's 
pupil,  Helena  as  leading  lady,  and  Josephine, 
her  younger  sister.  Stasia,  their  nine-year-old 
niece,  was  prompter.  The  plays  were  two 
pieces  now  forgotten — The  White  Camelia, 
in  one  act,  in  which  Helena  was  a  countess,  and 
The  Prima-Donna,  in  which  she  was  an  Ital- 
ian peasant  girl  who  became  an  actress.  De- 
lighted as  she  was  to  realize  her  cherished 
ambition  to  appear  on  the  stage  before  an  actual 
audience,  when  the  bell  rang  for  the  rise  of  the 
curtain  she  was  thoroughly  frightened.  Before 
she  went  on  she  could  not  think  of  her  lines,  and 
she  fairly  shook  with  nervousness.  Yet  once 
on  the  stage  her  words  came  to  her  and  she 
found  herself,  much  to  her  surprise,  quite  at 
her  ease.  The  dignitaries  and  the  country  gen- 
tlemen of  the  district  and  the  townspeople  all 
turned  out  for  the  performance,  and  for  the  two 
others  that  followed  it,  in  unexpectedly  large 
numbers.  Madame  Modjeska's  acting,  at  this 
her  first  opportunity  for  showing  it,  attracted 
attention.  An  actor  and  stage  manager  from 
Warsaw,  who  happened  to  be  in  Bochnia  and 
saw  her  act,  asked  her  how  long  she  had  been 
on  the  stage, — an  amusing  and  pleasing  ques- 


HELENA  MODJESKA  61 

tion, — and  urged  her  to  turn  her  eyes  toward 
Warsaw.  Such  men  do  not  pay  empty  compli- 
ments, and  Helena's  confidence  now  took  new 
hold.  The  prospect  of  going  to  Warsaw  drove 
from  her  mind  any  idea  of  becoming  a  German 
actress.  It  was  Warsaw  and  the  Imperial  The- 
atre, or  die ! 

Such  was  the  modest  beginning  of  a  career. 
Mr.  Modjeski,  so  far  from  objecting  to  his 
young  wife's  being  an  actress,  saw  in  the  new 
turn  of  affairs  a  chance  to  retrieve  the  family 
fortunes  and  to  get  a  living  for  them  all.  A 
license  for  a  traveling  company  was  obtained 
from  Cracow,  Mr.  Modjeski  constituted  himself 
manager,  and  the  little  band  of  players,  travel- 
ling in  a  peasant's  wagon,  went  on  to  New  San- 
dec.4  Here  the  company  was  gradually  en- 
larged until  it  had  nineteen  members,  and  here 
they  stayed  all  summer.  Helena  was  from  the 
beginning  their  star.  She  and  her  comrades 
were  but  strolling  players,  living  in  poorly  fur- 
nished quarters  and  eating  frugal  meals.  She 
had  but  two  dresses,  one  black  for  tragedy,  the 
other  white  for  comedy.  Yet  she  was  happy  as 
never  before  or  perhaps  since.  Long  after- 
ward she  thrilled  with  the  recollection  of  the 
enthusiasm  and  joy  of  those  early  days.  To 
live  in  her  own  world  of  youth  and  eager  be- 

*"The  picture  of  this  first  professional  trip  stands  vividly 
before  my  eyes.  The  weather  was  glorious!  .  .  .  We  were 
young,  full  of  spirit  and  hope,  and  the  country  enchanting. 
The  joy  was  so  great  that  I  sang.  We  made  plans  for  future 
work,  we  rode  in  the  clouds,  building  Spanish  castles." — Mem- 
ories and  Impressions  of  Helena  Modjeska. 


62      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

ginnings  and  at  the  same  time  in  the  imaginary 
world  of  her  heroines,  was  a  happiness  that  out- 
weighed all  lack  of  comforts. 

For  more  than  a  year  the  company  traveled 
about  in  Austrian  Poland.  It  was  during  this 
period  that  the  Polish  insurrection  of  1863  was 
brewing.  The  oppression  under  which  Eussian 
Poland  suffered  found  sympathy  in  Galitzia 
and  indeed  the  entire  Polish  people  was  in 
mourning.  Every  one,  at  least  in  the  towns, 
wore  black,  for  the  wearing  of  colors  was  prac- 
tically forbidden  by  public  feeling.  Yet  people 
contrived  to  go  to  the  theatre,  and  "The  New! 
Sandec  Combination,"  as  it  was  called,  pros- 
pered. Their  Polish  historical  pieces  roused 
the  patriotism  of  their  audiences  and  did  their 
share  in  maintaining  the  spirit  of  the  people 
in  the  face  of  the  Eussian  outrages. 

Madame  Modjeska  was  the  favorite  of  the 
provincial  public  to  which  her  company  ad- 
dressed itself.  The  popular  demand  for  her 
was  such  that  the  audiences  fell  off  when  she 
was  not  in  the  cast,  and  she  consequently  was 
forced  to  appear  constantly.  When  her  daugh- 
ter was  born 5  she  had  finished  acting  her  part 
in  a  five  act  tragedy  only  two  hours  before ;  and 
in  ten  days  she  was  again  appearing.  The  com- 
pany grew  in  size  and  improved  in  quality,  and 
their  repertoire  was  enlarged  to  include  such 
plays  as  Schiller's  Die  Rduber  and  Sheridan's 
The  School  for  Scandal. 

This  year  and  a  half  of  "barnstorming"  was 

o  Marylka;  she  lived  but  two  years. 


HELENA  MODJESKA  63 

invaluable  experience  for  Modjeska.  It  gave 
her  confidence  and  technique,  and,  finally,  recog- 
nition. One  of  the  managers  of  the  endowed 
theatre  of  Lemberg  6  had  seen  and  liked  her  act- 
ing. In  the  autumn  of  1862  the  Modjeskis  re- 
tired from  the  strolling  company,  and  after  a 
few  probationary  performances  Helena,  then 
twenty-two,  was  enrolled  a  member  of  the  resi- 
dent company  at  Lemberg.  With  her  first  op- 
portunity to  play  on  a  well-equipped  stage,  with 
good  actors,  and  before  a  city  audience,  she  felt 
that  she  had  made  a  distinct  step  upward.  She 
played  a  wide  variety  of  characters,  ranging 
from  great  ladies  to  pages,  ingenues,  and  the 
soubrette  parts  in  operetta.  She  profited  by 
the  example  and  the  friendly  advice  of  Madame 
Ashberger,  who  was  the  leading  lady,  but  the 
younger  women  of  the  company  were  jealous  of 
the  upstart  newcomer  with  the  pretty  face. 
They  influenced  the  management  to  give  Mod- 
jeska only  small  parts,  and  this,  with  the  insuf- 
ficiency of  the  salary,  so  discouraged  her  that 
after  a  year  at  Lemberg  she  and  her  husband 
returned  to  try  their  fortunes  again  in  the 
provinces. 

Mr.  Mod je ski  established  in  the  town  of  Czer- 
niowce  a  stock  company  that  was  largely  a 
family  affair.  Joseph  and  Felix  Benda,  Hel- 
ena's half-brothers,  her  sister's  husband  and 
Josephine  herself,  all  were  members,  while 
Simon  Benda  led  the  orchestra.  There  were 
more  than  twenty  actors  altogether,  some  of 

e  The  capital  of  Galitzia. 


64      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

whom  afterwards  became  famous  in  Poland. 
The  two  years  at  Czerniowce  Modjeska  filled 
with  hard  work.  1863  marked  the  crisis  in  the 
affairs  of  unhappy  Poland.  The  Galitzians 
were  only  less  stirred  by  the  tyranny  and  blood- 
shed in  Eussian  Poland  than  their  kinsfolk, 
the  victims.  Excitement  and  patriotic  feeling 
ran  high  and  troops  were  being  raised  every- 
where ;  yet  throughout  this  troublous  period  the 
theatres  prospered.  As  for  Modjeska,  with 
admirable  energy  and  ambition  she  studied  and 
worked.  So  far  she  had  not  played  in  tragedy. 
On  a  visit  to  Vienna,  a  brief  vacation  she  took 
to  see  a  bit  of  the  world  with  Mr.  Modjeski,  a 
manager  before  whom  she  tried  her  powers  in  a 
scene  from  Marie  Stuart  advised  her  to  cul- 
tivate her  voice  and  her  German  before  essay- 
ing the  more  serious  roles.  Accordingly  she 
practiced  faithfully  in  the  midst  of  a  busy 
career  at  the  theatre.  She  had  attained  a  con- 
siderable reputation  in  Galitzia,  and,  as  before, 
appeared  constantly,  not  only  in  the  company's 
home  town  but  in  towns  about  the  province. 
She  was  happy  in  her  work,  but  her  health  was 
suffering,  and  for  a  while  consumption  threat- 
ened her.  Other  troubles  soon  came.  In  1865 
her  two  year  old  daughter  died,  and  soon  after- 
wards other  misfortunes,  of  a  domestic  nature, 
ended  in  her  separation  from  her  husband, 
whom  she  never  saw  again. 

Moving  now  to  her  birthplace,  Cracow,  with 
her  mother,  her  little  son  and  her  brother  Felix, 
she  was  soon  a  member  of  the  company  at  the 


HELENA  MODJESKA  65 

old  theatre  where  she  had  been  taken,  years  be- 
fore, to  see  the  plays  that  had  so  greatly  excited 
her. 

Modjeska  began  her  three  years  at  Cracow 
when  she  was  almost  twenty-five.  She  had  at- 
tained genuine  popularity  in  her  own  province 
and  her  reputation  was  beginning,  among  those 
particularly  interested  in  the  drama,  to  extend 
to  other  parts  of  Poland.  As  the  able  stage 
director  at  Cracow,  Mr.  Jasinski,  told  her,  sho 
had  been  petted  by  the  public  and  spoiled  by  the 
critics.7  The  Cracow  theatre  was  beginning  a 
new  era  just  at  this  time  and  with  the  importa- 
tion into  its  management  of  a  group  of  enthus- 
iastic and  artistically  well-equipped  men  it  set 
for  itself  a  standard  equal  to  that  of  the  national 
theatre  at  Warsaw.  It  was  natural  therefore 
that  her  term  of  service  here  taught  Modjeska 
much.  First  she  learned  from  Mr.  Jasinski  for 
the  first  time  the  proper  delivery  of  blank  verse. 

7  One  of  the  circle  of  friends  in  the  aristocratic  and  literary 
world  which  Modjeska  now  began  to  acquire  was  the  Countess 
Patocka.  On  the  occasion  of  Modjeska's  first  visit  to  her, 
"her  judgment  was  just  and  most  kind.  She  said  she  thought 
I  was  unsuited  to  certain  parts,  but  she  was  much  pleased 
with  my  romantic  impersonations  and  also  with  some  of  the 
characters  in  high  comedy.  She  had  seen  Rachel  and  Ristori, 
and  told  me  I  had  neither  their  strong  ringing  voice  nor  their 
tragic  statuesque  poses.  'You  see/  said  she,  'they  were  born 
with  those  gifts,  and  God  created  you  differently.  You  have, 
instead  of  those  grand  qualities,  sensitiveness,  intuition, 
grace';  and  then  she  added,  laughingly,  'You  are  as  clever  as 
a  snake.  You  played  the  other  evening  the  Countess  in  The 
White  Camelia  as  if  you  were  born  among  us.  Where  did  you 
meet  countesses?'  I  answered  that  she  was  the  only  great 
lady  I  had  ever  laid  eyes  on.  'You  see/  said  she,  'that  was 
intuition.'  " — Memories  and  Impressions. 


66      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

At  his  earnest  solicitation,  and  under  the  sting 
of  remarks  by  a  jealous  fellow  actress,  who  ad- 
vised her  to  leave  serious  parts  alone,  she  reso- 
lutely undertook  tragic  characters  for  the  first 
time.  Her  parts  were  sometimes  small,  some- 
times important.8  After  her  performance  in 
Don  Carlos,  which  came  a  few  months  after 
she  joined  the  company  and  for  which  she  pre- 
pared herself  (since  Mr.  Jasinski  had  returned 
to  Warsaw),  she  felt  that  she  had  to  a  degree 
realized  her  ambition.  She  had  succeeded  in  a 
serious  part,  and  was  a  recognized  member  of 
an  important  company.  She  was  absorbed  and 
happy  in  her  work  and  thought  of  little  else.9 
The  political  troubles  of  Poland,  if  not  settled, 
were  at  least  stifled.  There  was  outward  calm 
to  match  the  content  with  which  Modjeska  la- 
bored during  these  important  years.  Those 
who  consider  success  on  the  stage  easily 
achieved  have  only  to  look  at  such  a  period  as 
this  in  the  life  of  a  great  actress.  She  fre- 
quently arose  at  five  in  the  morning  and  studied 
and  rehearsed  all  day.  She  and  her  brother 

s  Some  of  her  characters  at  this  time  were  Princess  Eboli  in 
Don  Carlos,  by  Schiller;  Louise  Miller  in  Kalale  und  Liebe, 
by  Schiller;  Barbara  in  the  tragedy  of  that  name  by  Felinski; 
Ophelia  in  Hamlet;  Dona  Sol  in  Ernani,  by  Victor  Hugo;  the 
wife  in  Nos  Intimes,  by  Sardou;  and  Adrienne  Lecouvreur  in 
the  play  of  that  name  by  Scribe  and  Legouve". 

9  "I  do  not  recollect  going  to  parties,  save  to  those  given 
twice  a  year  by  the  manager,  Count  Skorupka;  one  dancing 
party  during  the  Carnival  and  another  at  Easter  time,  and 
then  I  danced!  Oh,  how  I  danced!  with  all  my  soul  in  it,  for 
I  never  did  anything  by  halves.  Still  I  preferred  the  few 
receptions  at  my  brother's  house." — Memories  and  Impressions. 


HELENA  MODJESKA  67 

Felix  would  go  over  scenes  at  all  hours  and  in 
all  places.  She  carefully  worked  out  the  last 
detail  of  costuming,  of  pose  or  intonation,  de- 
veloping her  impersonations  to  her  utmost. 
And  when  the  time  for  performance  came,  she 
threw  herself  into  her  work  body  and  soul. 
There  has  always  been  much  discussion  as  to 
whether  or  not  an  actor,  for  the  best  effect, 
should  "feel  his  part."  Modjeska  was  always 
one  of  those  who  did.  "I  really  passed  through 
all  the  emotions  of  my  heroines,"  she  after- 
wards wrote.  "I  suffered  with  them,  cried  real 
tears,  which  I  often  could  not  stop  even  after 
the  curtain  was  down.  Owing  to  this  extreme 
sensitiveness  I  was  exhausted  after  each  emo- 
tional part,  and  often  had  to  rest  motionless 
after  the  play  until  my  strength  returned.  I 
tried  hard  to  master  my  emotions,  but  during 
my  whole  career  I  could  not  succeed  in  giving 
a  performance  without  feeling  the  agonies  of 
my  heroines." 

It  was  during  a  visit  of  the  Cracow  Company 
to  Posen,  the  capital  of  Prussian  Poland,  that 
Madame  Modjeska  met  Count  Karol  Bozenta 
Chlapowski,  who  was  soon  to  be  her  second  hus- 
band.10 He  came  of  a  noble  Polish  family  and 
had  served  in  the  revolt  of  1863.  At  the  time 
he  met  Modjeska  (1866)  he  was  a  writer  on  poli- 
tics and  the  drama  for  one  of  the  newspapers 
of  Posen.  In  this  capacity  he  commented 
frankly  on  the  shortcomings  he  found  in  Mod- 
jeska 's  acting,  but  his  candor  did  not  prevent 

10  Gustave  Modrzejewski  had  died  some  time  before. 


68      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

their  becoming  good  friends.  He  coached  her 
in  French,  and  they  read  and  talked  much  to- 
gether. It  was  here,  when  romance  was  coming 
into  her  own  life,  that  she  read  for  the  first  time 
Romeo  and  Juliet.  It  carried  her  to  the  highest 
pitch  of  enthusiasm  for  Shakespeare.  At  her 
earnest  wish,  it  was  played  successfully  with 
Modjeska  as  Juliet,  while  the  company  was  in 
Posen. 

Before  she  returned  to  Cracow  to  act,  Mod- 
jeska was  granted  leave  of  six  weeks,  with  the 
suggestion  that  she  go  to  Paris  and  study  the 
best  French  actors.  Paris  charmed  her,  while 
her  visits  to  the  theatres — and  every  evening 
found  her  in  one  or  another — were  inspiring  to 
the  sensitive  young  woman  on  the  threshold  of 
her  own  career.  The  restraint  of  the  French 
actors'  methods,  their  admirable  grace  and  pre- 
cision, their  imaginative  identification  with 
their  characters,  and  the  ensemble  which  is  the 
mark  of  the  French  stage  at  its  best,  were  noted 
for  her  own  good  by  the  rising  Polish  star. 

She  was  given  an  ovation  when  she  reap- 
peared at  Cracow.  Romeo  and  Juliet  was 
repeated  and,  to  her  delight  (for  Shakespeare 
was  her  constant  enthusiasm),  she  had  an  op- 
portunity to  appear  as  Lady  Anne  in  Richard 
the  Third,  as  Titania  in  A  Midsummer  Night's 
Dream,  and  as  Desdemona  in  Othello.  Many 
plays  from  the  French  and  German  were 
also  given,  but  the  basis  of  the  Cracow  theatre 's 
repertoire  was  naturally  Polish. 

This  was  to  Modjeska  a  happy  and  successful 


HELENA  MODJESKA  69 

period.  As  was  her  custom,  she  threw  herself 
into  her  work  with  all  her  energy,  and  besides 
her  parts  studied  hard  her  French,  her  music, 
and  even  an  elaborate  course  in  history.  In- 
deed she  worked  so  during  this  year  (1866-7) 
that  one  day,  during  a  rehearsal  of  Kabale  und 
Liebe  she  suddenly  lost  her  memory;  she  could 
not  think  of  a  word  of  her  part.  In  two  weeks, 
however,  she  had  recovered  and  was  at  work 
again. 

In  1868  she  married  Count  Chlapowski 
and  thereby  became  a  member  of  the  aristoc- 
racy. She  was  not  the  first  actress  to  marry 
into  the  Polish  nobility,  but  in  her  case,  as  in 
none  before,  the  husband's  family  and  society 
in  general  welcomed  her  with  open  arms.  And 
indeed,  in  receiving  into  their  number  a  woman 
of  her  personal  worth  and  attainments,  they 
were  accepting  rather  than  bestowing  honor. 

Now  came  the  moment  that  Modjeska  herself 
always  believed  to  be  the  turning  point  in  her 
career.  Seven  years  before,  when  she  and 
three  other  amateurs  were  giving  their  little 
plays  for  charity  in  Bochnia,  she  had  been  seen, 
it  will  be  remembered,  by  one  of  the  staff  of 
managers  of  the  Warsaw  Imperial  Theatre. 
He  had  told  her  that  one  day  he  hoped  to  see 
her  in  Warsaw.  Now,  in  1868,  her  reputation 
as  one  of  the  leading  actresses  of  the  Cracow 
theatre  brought  about  the  fulfillment  of  his 
hope,  for  she  was  invited  to  Warsaw  to  give  a 
special  series  of  performances.  As  for  her,  this 
was  the  realization  of  a  dream.  She  did  not 


70      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

then  even  think  of  the  career  she  was  to  have 
in  foreign  lands  in  a  language  other  than  Po- 
lish. She  was  intensely  patriotic,  and  the  ut- 
most reasonable  limit  of  her  ambition  was  to 
act  in  the  Imperial  Theatre  at  Warsaw.  It  was 
one  of  the  great  state  theatres  of  Europe,  con- 
trolled and  subsidized  by  the  Eussian  Govern- 
ment, and,  with  its  various  companies  for  seri- 
ous drama,  comedy,  opera,  and  comic  opera,  its 
ballet,  choruses,  orchestras,  schools,  officials  and 
employees,  enrolled  something  over  seven  hun- 
dred people.  It  was  extraordinary  for  an  act- 
ress who  had  not  gone  through  the  school  and 
waited  her  chance  of  gradual  promotion  to  ap- 
pear on  its  stage;  and  the  innovation  aroused 
the  keenest  hostility  among  the  members  of  the 
company.  The  husband  of  one  of  the  actresses 
was  an  editor,  and  before  Modjeska  appeared, 
attacked  her  in  print.  When  the  newcomer  re- 
hearsed for  the  first  time  attempts  were  begun 
to  discredit  her.  The  rehearsal  of  her  part  in 
Les  Idees  de  Madame  Aubray  went  so  well 
that  she  was  jubilant  until  it  was  suddenly  an- 
nounced that  owing  to  the  sickness  of  one  of  the 
actors  (who  up  to  now  was  apparently  in  per- 
fect health)  the  play  would  have  to  be  changed. 
In  the  rehearsal  Modjeska  had  shown  such  abil- 
ity that  the  clique  arrayed  against  her  knew 
their  point  would  be  lost  unless  some  play  were 
put  on  that  would  test  her  powers  more  se- 
verely. So  Adrienne  Lecouvreur  was  sug- 
gested, a  play  in  which  Eachel  had  been  the  only 
one  thoroughly  to  succeed.  Modjeska  saw  the 


HELENA  MODJESKA  71 

danger,  but  agreed  to  play  Adrienne.  At  re- 
hearsal she  little  more  than  " walked  through" 
her  part,  taking  care  not  to  reveal  her  best 
powers,  lest  the  unpleasant  incident  be  re- 
peated. The  cabal  succeeded,  however,  in  play- 
ing her  another  trick:  at  the  last  moment  an- 
other actress,  the  wife  of  the  hostile  editor,  was 
given  Modjeska's  part  of  Adrienne  for  the  first 
performance  of  the  play's  revival.  This  was 
intended  to  decrease  the  interest  in  Modjeska's 
first  appearance;  yet  when  her  night  arrived 
the  great  house  was  filled.  The  controversy 
over  her  invitation  to  Warsaw,  and  the  unusual 
spectacle  of  a  nobleman's  actress-wife  continu- 
ing to  act  after  her  marriage,  combined  to 
arouse  the  keenest  interest. 

The  audience  received  her  cordially,  and  list- 
ened attentively.  At  the  close  of  the  fable  of 
the  two  pigeons,  a  passage  which  she  delivered 
with  much  charm  and  tenderness,  there  was  such 
applause  as  she  had  never  heard  before.  After 
each  act  she  was  called  out  again  and  again,  and 
at  the  end  of  the  play  received  an  unprecedented 
ovation.  Even  those  members  of  the  company 
who  had  tried  to  prevent  her  appearance  were 
won  over  by  her  power,  her  grace,  and  her  im- 
mediate success,  and  appeared  in  her  dressing- 
room  to  congratulate  her.  Next  day  all  the 
papers  praised  her,  and  during  the  next  week 
the  cards  and  invitations  that  formed  the  trib- 
ute of  Warsaw  society  poured  in  upon  her. 

Within  a  few  days  Modjeska  had  signed  a 
contract  to  play  at  the  Imperial  Warsaw  The- 


72      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

atre  the  rest  of  her  life,  the  term  of  her  service 
to  begin  in  the  autumn  of  1869,  for  she  had  still 
(in  1868)  to  complete  her  season  in  Cracow. 
In  view  of  the  conditions  under  which  American 
and  English  actors,  even  those  of  the  first  rank, 
are  to-day  obliged  to  work,  it  is  interesting  to 
note  the  terms  of  Modjeska's  contract  at  War- 
saw. She  was  to  have  twenty-five  thousand 
florins  n  a  year,  four  months  holiday  in  each 
year,  eight  hundred  roubles  12  yearly  for  gowns, 
and  an  annual  benefit  performance.  She  was 
to  be  permitted  to  act  each  year  in  six  new  plays 
of  her  awn.  choice  (a  great  concession  on  the 
part  of  a  Conservative  management)  and  was 
to  be  expected  to  appear  only  three  times  a 
week!  When  she  departed  for  Cracow,  the 
people  of  Warsaw  crowded  to  the  station, 
throwing  flowers  into  her  carriage,  and  shout- 
ing their  farewells.  The  visit  to  Warsaw  had 
indeed  been  a  triumph. 

Count  Chlapowski's  interest  in  a  new  political 
party  and  his  editorship  of  its  daily  paper  in 
Cracow  brought  about  him  and  his  wife,  who 
after  the  end  of  the  season  in  the  spring  of  1869 
laid  aside  for  the  moment  her  theatrical  work,  a 
political  and  literary  salon.  Poets,  patriots, 
scientific  men,  artists,  all  were  found  at  the 
house  of  the  charming  actress  and  the  noble- 
man-editor.13 During  her  three  seasons  at 

11  Ten  thousand  dollars. 

12  Over  two  thousand  dollars. 

is  On  one  occasion  Modjeska  acted  as  an  impromptu  re- 
porter for  her  husband's  paper,  proving  the  reliability  of  her 
stage-trained  memory.  Liebelt,  the  scientist,  delivered  a  lee- 


HELENA  MODJESKA  73 

Cracow  she  had  played  one  hundred  and  thir- 
teen parts — an  impressive  achievement  in  itself. 
Modjeska  was  now  expected  to  act  in  Warsaw 
for  the  rest  of  her  life.  Instead,  she  remained 
less  than  seven  years. 

Her  departure  was  brought  about  by  sev- 
eral causes.  It  was  not  long  before  she  be- 
came the  moving  spirit  of  the  whole  vast 
organization.  As  the  extension  of  the  reper- 
toire was  largely  in  her  hands,  it  was  to  her 
that  translators  and  authors  had  to  apply.  She 
therefore  had  considerable  responsibility, 
which  she  appreciated,  concerning  the  develop- 
ment of  the  Polish  drama.  The  management 
found  itself  deferring  to  her  in  all  kinds  of  mat- 
ters. Moreover,  her  husband,  forced  to  a 
choice  between  his  own  career  and  hers,  had 
given  up  his  Cracow  interests,  and  together  in 
Warsaw  they  soon  found  themselves  the  center 
of  social  interest.  Their  salon  became  an  es- 
tablished and  brilliant  affair.  Her  domination 
of  an  artistic  and  social  world  to  which  she  was 
a  newcomer  naturally  aroused  envy,  and  result- 
ing attempts  to  make  her  uncomfortable  had 
their  part  in  wearying  her  of  Warsaw.  Then, 
in  her  ambition  to  enlarge  and  enrich  the  the- 
atre's repertoire,  she  had  constantly  to  combat 
the  autocracy  and  unintelligence  of  the  Russian 

ture  on  Spectrum  Analysis,  and  as  no  stenographic  reporter 
was  to  be  had,  Modjeska  went  to  the  hall,  listened  intently  to 
the  lecturer  and  although  the  subject  was  absolutely  new  to 
her,  went  home  and  wrote  a  complete  resume"  of  the  lecture, 
technical  and  Latin  words  included.  Her  report  was  printed, 
while  that  of  a  reporter  was  used  merely  as  an  introduction. 


74      HEKOINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

censorship.  When  she  wished  to  produce 
Hamlet  the  censor  objected  to  a  play  in 
which  a  King  was  murdered,  as  a  possible  sug- 
gestion of  disloyal  ideas,  and  it  was  only  when 
he  was  shown  that  the  murder  was  a  family 
affair,  not  a  public  assassination,  that  he  reluc- 
tantly relented.  To  another  play  he  objected 
on  the  ground  that  it  contained  a  Polish  king,  to 
a  Eussian  an  unthinkable  person.  The  king 
had  to  be  changed  to  a  prince.  Covert  allusions 
to  the  wrongs  of  Poland  were  suspected  where 
none  existed  and  even  certain  words  were  ta- 
boo. A  love  passage  might  be  suspected  to  be 
an  apostrophe  to  the  oppressed  mother  country ; 
the  word  " slave"  was  considered  objectionable, 
and  " negro"  substituted;  if  a  character  said: 
"I  love  my  country  and  my  people,"  his  affec- 
tions were  transferred  by  official  order  to  his 
wife  and  children,  and,  in  one  play  the  words: 
"He  walked  arm  in  arm  with  the  emperor  and 
whispered  in  his  ear,"  were  changed  to  "He 
walked  three  steps  behind  the  emperor  and 
whispered  in  his  ear"!  Such  obstructions  to 
Modjeska's  plans,  though  often  amusing,  were 
of  tener  maddening. 

In  1875  Madame  Mouchanoff,  the  wife  of  the 
president  of  the  Warsaw  theatre,  died.  A  wo- 
man of  great  refinement,  intellect,  and  force,  she 
had  befriended  and  inspired  Modjeska,  and  the 
loss  of  her  was  severe.  In  the  same  year  Felix 
Benda  died,  another  blow,  for  her  half-brother 
had  been  a  good  friend  and  wise  counselor.  In 
the  meantime  Modjeska  had  herself  had  a  se- 


HELENA  MOD JE SKA  75 

vere  illness.  Now,  in  the  spring  of  1876,  the 
nervousness  induced  by  her  strenuous  career 
on  the  stage  and  in  society  combined  with 
sorrow  over  the  attacks  on  her  and  irritation 
with  the  censor  to  induce  a  melancholy,  a  pes- 
simism, that  brought  her  to  a  dangerous  state 
of  discouragement  and  ill-health. 

One  night  the  Chlapowskis  and  their  guests 
were  discussing  America  and  the  coming  Cen- 
tennial Exposition  at  Philadelphia.  At  first  in 
jest,  a  general  emigration  to  America  was  sug- 
gested. They  would  have  there  an  ideal  com- 
munity, a  care-free  natural  life  far  removed 
from  Russian  oppression,  and  Pani  Helena14 
could  have  her  much  needed  rest.  The  idea 
took  root.  The  would-be  emigrants  were 
thought  foolish  by  most  of  their  friends,  but 
Henryk  Sienkiewicz  (afterwards  the  famous 
author  of  Quo  Vadis?),  Count  Chlapowski 
himself,  his  friends  Jules  Sypniewski  and  Lu- 
cian  Paprocki,  were  all  soon  in  deadly  earnest. 
California  they  had  heard  of  as  an  earthly  para- 
dise, where  life  was  idyllic  and  the  earth  yielded 
up  not  only  an  easily  won  living,  but  fortune. 

The  suddenly  achieved  result  was  that  Sien- 
kiewicz sailed  for  America  in  a  few  months,  and 
the  others  arranged  to  follow.  Modjeska  ob- 
tained leave  of  absence  from  the  president  of 
the  theatre,  who  cheerfully  expected  her  to  come 
back,  but  fixed  a  forfeit  of  six  thousand  roubles 
if  she  did  not.  In  June,  1876,  she  appeared 
in  Warsaw  for  the  last  time.  There  was  a 

i*  "Mrs.  Helena." 


76      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

great  popular  demonstration.  The  house  was 
crowded  and  to  the  highest  degree  enthusiastic. 
After  the  performance  the  audience  formed  a 
double  rank  to  the  gates  of  the  theatre  grounds 
and  shouted  their  farewells  and  praises.  The 
public,  at  least,  was  with  her  to  the  last.15 

In  July,  1876,  she  sailed  from  Bremen  for 
New  York,  with  Count  Chlapowski,  her  son  Ru- 
dolphe,  Jules  Sypniewski,  his  wife  and  two  chil- 
dren, and  Lucian  Paprocki, — a  strange  band  of 
pilgrims,  artists  with  little  but  their  ideals  and 
comradeship  to  fit  them  for  pioneering  in  a 
strange  country,  headed  by  a  woman  who  was 
giving  up  a  career  of  grande  dame  and  pre- 
miere artiste  for  the  prospect  of  life  on  a  farm 
eight  thousand  miles  or  so  from  the  scene  of 
her  triumphs ! 

Modjeska  had  never  seen  the  ocean,  and  the 
voyage  of  thirteen  days  was  invigorating.  Her 
party  spent  about  a  month  in  New  York,  making 
excursions  to  Philadelphia  to  see  the  exposition, 
where  she  admired  the  vegetables  and  fruits 
from  California,  experimented  with  those 
dainties  new  to  her,  pop-corn  and  peanuts,  and 
found  them  tasteless,  and  visited  the  art  ex- 
hibits. New  York  of  1876  she  thought  a  "mon- 
strous, untidy  bazaar."  In  August  they 
started  for  California,  taking  ship  for  Panama. 

15  Her  repertoire  at  Warsaw  had  been  wide-ranged  and  long, 
embracing  translations  of  Shakespeare,  and  of  many  French 
and  German  plays  as  well  as  the  numerous  Polish  parts.  She 
introduced  the  obvious  but  hitherto  neglected  method  of  play- 
ing Shakespeare  in  a  Polish  translation  directly  from  the  Eng- 
lish, instead  of  through  a  French  version. 


HELENA  MODJESKA  77 

She  found  charming  her  first  glimpse  of  the 
tropics,  during  the  railroad  trip  across  the  Isth- 
mus, and  the  three  weeks7  voyage  on  the  Pacific 
went  far  to  restore  her  vigor  and  peace  of  mind. 
The  impression  has  been  that  Modjeska  re- 
turned to  the  stage  because  of  the  failure  of  the 
farming  experiment  which  was  now  to  be  made. 
To  a  certain  extent  this  is  true,  but  even  before 
she  reached  California  she  certainly  had  vague 
plans  to  act  again.  In  a  letter  from  New 
York  she  had  said:  "It  seems  that  I  may  be 
able  to  play  in  English,  but  first  we  must  go  to 
California,  according  to  our  original  plan. 
.  .  .  Perhaps  after  we  get  established  in  this 
new  paradise  I  may  pick  up  enough  English  to 
play  there,  and  when  I  get  more  mastery  over 
the  new  language,  I  may  come  here;  for,  how- 
ever unattractive  New  York  seems  to  me,  it  is 
the  metropolis  of  America,  and  it  will  give  me 
pleasure  to  conquer  it."  This  was  surely  fore- 
casting the  future.  When  she  reached  San 
Francisco,  Edwin  Booth  was  playing  there.  It 
was  proposed  that  she  act  Ophelia  in  Polish,  to 
his  Hamlet.  Bather  to  her  relief,  Booth,  who 
had  never  heard  of  her,  declined.  She  saw  him 
as  Antony  and  as  Shylock  and  of  course  recog- 
nized him  as  the  great  actor  that  he  was,  though 
as  yet  she  could  not  understand  English.16 

16  In  1877  Edwin  Booth  had,  rightly  enough,  declined  to 
play  with  Modjeska.  In  1889,  however,  it  was  another  story. 
Lawrence  Barrett,  at  that  time  Booth's  manager,  proposed  her 
appearance  as  a  "co-star."  Modjeska  gladly  availed  herself 
of  the  opportunity  to  act  with  Mr.  Booth,  and  played  with 
him  in  Hamlet,  Macbeth,  The  Merchant  of  Venice,  Much  Ado 


78          HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

As  for  the  community  farming  experiment  at 
Anaheim,  it  was  a  failure  that  would  appear 
ludicrous  if  it  were  not  for  its  element  of  trag- 
edy. All  of  the  experimenters  were  desper- 
ately homesick,  and  none  of  them  had  the  least 
practical  notion  of  the  task  they  had  set  them- 
selves. They  talked  more  than  they  worked, 
quarreled  and  made  up,  and  were  generally 
helpless.  Modjeska,  the  queen  of  the  Warsaw 
stage,  did  the  cooking,  with  the  frightened  as- 
sistance of  a  Polish  maid  they  had  taken  from 
a  convent  to  be  a  helper  with  the  children.17 
They  had  several  cows,  but  no  one  knew  how  to 
milk  them,  and  their  butter  and  milk  they  had 
to  buy.  The  orange  trees  were  too  young  to 
bear,  the  season  was  dry,  the  neighbors'  cattle 
ate  the  barley,  the  dogs  ate  the  eggs,  and  the 
ready  money  was  fast  disappearing.  The  un- 
fortunate town-bred  would-be  farmers  were 

about  Nothing,  and  Richelieu.    The  tour  took  them  through- 
out the  East  and  the  Middle  West. 

IT  The  entire  party  would  leave  their  farm  and  go  on  short 
vacation  trips.  Of  one  of  these,  Modjeska  says:  "I  listened 
and  looked  at  everything,  but  I  grew  quite  sad  when  I  turned 
my  eyes  toward  the  ocean.  The  blue  waters  of  the  great  Pa- 
cific reminded  me  of  our  first  sea-voyage  when  we  left  our 
country.  The  recollections  of  the  happy  past,  spent  among  be- 
loved people, — Cracow,  with  its  churches  and  monuments,  the 
kind  friends  waiting  for  our  return,  the  stage,  and  the  dear 
public  I  left  behind, — all  came  back  to  my  mind,  and  I  felt  a 
great  acute  pang  of  homesickness.  I  stepped  away  from  the 
rest,  threw  myself  on  the  sand  and  sobbed  and  sobbed,  min- 
gling my  moans  with  those  of  the  ocean,  until,  exhausted,  I 
had  not  one  drop  of  tears  left  in  my  eyes.  A  sort  of  torpor 
took  the  place  of  despair,  and  the  world  became  a  vast  empti- 
ness, sad  and  without  any  charm." 


HELENA  MODJESKA  79 

doomed  to  failure  from  the  start.  So  Modjeska 
determined  upon  the  courageous  and  difficult 
course  which  brought  in  time  so  great  an  addi- 
tion to  her  fame.  She  decided  to  go  to  San 
Francisco,  learn  English,  and  go  upon  the 
American  stage. 

In  March,  1877,  she  wote  from  San  Francisco 
to  a  friend  in  Poland:  "I  am  hard  at  work, 
studying.  That  was  my  secret  plan,  at  the  very 
beginning  of  our  venture.  Country  life  was 
simply  to  restore  my  health  and  strength,  which 
it  did  so  effectively  that  people  give  me  twenty- 
four  or  twenty-six  years  of  age,  not  more  .  .  . 
Next  autumn  I  want  to  ask  the  president 18 
which  he  prefers,  either  six  thousand  roubles 
for  breaking  my  contract,  or  my  return  in  two 
years  with  fame." 

She  could  not  have  returned  to  Warsaw,  in- 
deed, had  she  wished  to  do  so,  for  she  was  now 
poor.  She  even  sold  some  of  her  family  silver 
to  maintain  herself  and  her  son  in  San  Fran- 
cisco while  Mr.  Chlapowski  19  was  winding  up 
the  affairs  of  the  farm.  With  a  young  Polish- 
American  woman  as  tutor,  she  labored  inces- 
santly with  English,  and  to  such  good  effect  that 
in  about  six  months,  having  gotten  Adrienne 
and  Juliet  letter-perfect,  she  applied  for  an  en- 
gagement at  the  California  Theatre.  John 

is  Of  the  Imperial  Theatre  in  Warsaw. 

19  He  became  an  American  citizen  and  dropped  his  title  of 
nobility.  Because  of  the  difficulty  in  pronouncing  Chlapowski, 
he  was  known  in  America  by  his  second  name,  and  was  called 
Mr.  Bozenta. 


80        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

McCullough  was  the  star  and  manager,  but  he 
was  absent.  His  representative,  Barton  Hill, 
knew  nothing  of  Madame  Modjeska  and  told 
her  there  was  no  opportunity  to  engage  her  as 
a  star.  Her  friend  the  tutor  persisted,  and  ob- 
tained an  appointment  for  a  hearing,  but  when 
Modjeska  presented  herself  at  the  theatre  he 
found  himself  unable  to  keep  the  engagement. 
She  was  deeply  discouraged.  A  star  of  the  first 
magnitude  at  home,  here  she  had  to  beg  for  a 
hearing,  and  then  be  refused.  When  she  again 
applied  at  the  theatre  and  Mr.  Hill  sent  word 
that  he  was  too  busy  to  see  her,  she  was  gen- 
uinely humiliated.  Some  Polish  friends  inter- 
ceded, however,  and  a  rehearsal  was  arranged. 
Mr.  Hill  at  last  heard  her,  in  an  act  of  Ad- 
rienne  Lecouvreur.  He  was  unprepared  for 
what  he  was  to  experience,  for  so  far  as  he  knew 
she  was  merely  another  " society  woman"  with 
a  craze  for  the  stage.  She  was  stung  to  her 
best  efforts,  and  at  the  end  of  the  scene  Mr.  Hill 
was  a  changed  man.20  Modjeska  was  to  have  a 

20  "Hill  was  a  worthy  man  and  a  good  actor  .  .  .  but  there 
will  always  be  something  ludicrous  in  the  thought  of  Barton 
Hill  sitting  in  judgment  on  Helena  Modjeska.  'He  was  very 
kind — Meester  Hill/  said  the  actress;  'but  he  was  ne-ervous 
and  fussy,  and  he  patronized  me  as  though  I  were  a  leetle 
child.  "Now,"  he  said,  "I  shall  be  very  criti-cal — ve-ery 
severe."  I  could  be  patient  no  longer:  "Be  as  critical  and 
severe  as  you  like,"  I  burst  out,  "only  do,  please,  be  quiet,  and 
let  us  begin!"  He  was  so  surprised  he  could  not  speak,  and 
I  began  at  once  a  scene  from  Adrienne.  I  played  it  through 
and  then  turned  to  him.  He  had  his  handkerchief  in  his 
hand  and  was  crying.  He  came  and  shook  hands  with  me  and 
tried  to  seem  quite  calm.  "Well,"  I  asked,  "may  I  have  the 


HELENA  MODJESKA  81 

week,  more  if  possible.  She  had  to  go  through 
another  trial  when  Mr.  McCullough  returned, 
but  the  result  was  a  fortnight's  engagement. 
On  the  first  night,  playing  in  a  strange  tongue, 
she  was  quite  free  from  nervousness,  and  know- 
ing the  part  well  did  it  full  justice.  She  sent  a 
dispatch  of  a  single  word,  "Victory,"  to  her 
husband;  the  newspapers  pronounced  her  ap- 
pearance "the  most  confirmed  dramatic 
triumph  that  ever  occurred  in  the  city";  Sien- 
kiewicz,  then  in  San  Francisco,  sent  a  glowing 
letter  to  his  Warsaw  paper,  and  Modjeska's 
American  career  was  launched.21 

The  next  morning  at  eight  o'clock  an  enter- 
prising theatrical  manager  called  to  propose 
her  appearance  in  the  eastern  cities.  In  De- 
cember, 1877,  after  less  than  a  year's  study  of 
English  she  appeared  as  a  star  in  New  York. 
The  story  of  her  career  in  Poland  had  been  one 
of  long  continued  striving,  of  years  of  mingled 
hard  work  and  disappointment,  and  of  final 
brilliant  success.  In  America,  by  what  has  be- 
come in  stage  annals  a  classical  example  of  will 
and  courage,  she  attained  equally  brilliant  suc- 

evening  that  I  want?"  "I'll  give  you  a  week,  and  more,  if  I 
can,"  he  answered.' " — William  Winter,  The  Wallet  of  Time. 

21  It  was  John  McCullough  who  at  this  time  suggested  the 
modification  of  her  name.  Her  professional  name  in  Poland 
had  always  remained  Modrzejewska.  When  confronted  with 
this,  McCullough  said:  "Who  on  earth  could  read  that,  I 
wonder?  I  fear  you  will  be  compelled  to  change  your  name, 
Madame."  She  suggested  Modgeska,  which  he  smilingly  said 
would  remind  people  of  Madagascar.  The  "g"  was  changed 
to  "j."  "Now,"  McCullough  said,  "it  is  quite  easy  to  read, 
and  sounds  pretty,  I  think." 


82         HEROINES  OF  THE  MODEEN  STAGE 

cess  in  a  few  weeks,  in  a  foreign  land  and  in  a 
recently  acquired  tongue. 

It  was  not  long  before  Modjeska  was  firmly 
established  as  an  international  artist — a  title 
that  has  been  applied  with  justification  to  act- 
resses only  very  rarely.  From  this  time,  in  the 
early  eighties,  until  the  close  of  the  century  she 
led  the  life  of  such  an  artist — known  to  the 
theatregoers  of  two  continents  as  no  other  of 
her  time  save  only  Bernhardt.  Her  American 
tours  brought  her  before  the  public  throughout 
the  country,  her  name  was  equally  familiar  in 
the  various  cities  of  the  British  Isles,  while  dur- 
ing her  frequent  visits  to  Poland  she  acted  in 
her  own  tongue  among  those  to  whom  she  had 
become  one  of  the  country's  glories.22 

22  Her  first  appearance  in  New  York  was  in  Adrienne 
Lecouvreur.  The  other  plays  of  that  season  and  the  one  fol- 
lowing were  Romeo  and  Juliet;  Camille;  Frou-Frou;  Peg 
Woffington  (in  which  she  failed)  ;  and  East  Lynne  (which 
she  heartily  disliked). 

Adrienne  Lecouvreur,  Romeo  and  Juliet  and  Camille  were 
for  many  years  retained  in  her  repertoire.  Her  appearances 
in  other  plays  were  as  follows:  Heartsease  (adaptation  of 
Camille},  London,  1880;  Marie  Stuart,  London,  1880;  Juana, 
(a  failure,  by  W.  G.  Wills),  London,  1881;  A  Doll's  House, 
Warsaw,  1882;  Odette,  London,  1882;  As  You  Like  It  and 
Twelfth  Night,  New  York,  1882;  Nadjezda  (by  Maurice  Barry- 
more),  1884;  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona,  Cymbeline,  and 
Prince  Zillah,  season  of  1885-6;  Les  Chouans,  Measure  for 
Measure,  Dona  Diana,  and  Daniela,  1886;  with  Edwin  Booth, 
Hamlet,  Much  Ado  about  Nothing,  Macbeth,  Merchant  of 
Venice,  and  Richelieu,  1889;  Countess  Roudine  (by  Paul 
Kester  and  Minnie  Maddern  Fiske),  and  Henry  VIII,  1892; 
The  Tragic  Mask,  1893;  Magda,  1894;  Mistress  Betty  Single- 
ton (by  Clyde  Fitch),  1895;  Antony  and  Cleopatra,  1898; 
The  Ladies'  Battle,  1900;  Marie  Antoinette  (by  Clinton 
Stuart)  and  King  John,  1900.  In  a  letter  furnishing  some 


HELENA  MODJESKA  83 

In  seeking  the  reasons  for  Modjeska's  bril- 
liant success  and  in  estimating  her  as  an  actress, 
one  at  once  recognizes  that  she  was  first  of  all 
a  woman  of  great  charm,  dignity  and  intelli- 
gence. She  was  a  grande  dame,  a  woman  who 
was  also  a  "lady,"  in  the  best  sense  of  that  mis- 
cellaneous word.  Her  friendships  in  her  native 
Poland  included  literally  almost  every  one  who 
was  distinguished  or  gave  promise  of  being  so. 
Though  born  among  the  people,  by  unaffected 
personal  worth  she  found  herself  at  once  at 
home  among  the  aristocracy  into  which  she  mar- 

of  the  above  dates,  Modjeska's  husband,  who  died  in  Cracow, 
in  March,  1914,  wrote  from  Rzegocin,  Posen,  July  10, 
1913: 

"The  Tragic  Mask  was  written  by  Mr.  E.  Reynolds.  It 
was  an  original  play,  somewhat  deficient  in  construction;  but 
the  dialogue  was  very  clever.  Daniela  was  a  translation 
from  a  German  play  by  Phillippi.  The  translators  were 
Hamilton  Bell  and  Moritz  von  Sachs.  As  to  Les  Chouans: 
This  was  an  adaptation  of  Balzac's  novel  of  the  same  title, 
made  in  French  by  the  well-known  actor  and  dramatist, 
Pierre  Berton,  and  translated  by  Paul  Potter. 

"In  addition  to  the  abovesaid  repertoire  it  must  be  men- 
tioned that  Madame  Modjeska  played  A  Doll's  House  not 
only  in  Poland,  but  also  in  America,  in  Louisville,  in  the 
season  of  1883-1884.  This  was,  to  my  knowledge,  the  first 
production  of  Ibsen  on  an  English-speaking  stage.  Though 
the  part  of  Nora  was  considered  in  Poland,  I  think  rightly, 
one  of  Modjeska's  best  ones,  A  Doll's  House  did  not  appeal 
then  to  the  American  public.  According  to  local  critics,  and 
especially  to  Henry  Watterson,  the  audiences  were  not  yet  ripe 
for  Ibsen. 

"Besides  the  plays  you  enumerated,  Mme.  Modjeska  ap- 
peared yet  in  a  few  others  on  special  occasions.  Thus,  in  the 
spring  of  1884,  in  Cincinnati  at  a  dramatic  festival,  she 
played  Desdemona  to  Tom  Keene's  Othello.  In  1905  in  Los 
Angeles,  she  took  part  in  a  charitable  performance  and  played 
Hermione  in  The  Winter's  Tale,  and  in  the  summer  of  1907 


84        HEROINES  OP  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

ried,  an  aristocracy  of  genuine  breeding  and 
simplicity.  As  we  shall  see,  her  record  of 
friendships  in  England  and  America  was  of  the 
kind  that  is  achieved  only  by  a  choice  spirit. 

Provided  she  remains  herself  simple  and  well- 
poised,  a  woman  of'  this  sort,  when  placed  on 
the  stage,  has  an  obvious  advantage  in  parts 
such  as  Modjeska's  over  the  woman  who  with 
equal  technical  ability  has  not  had  the  same  ex- 
perience of  the  world.  Without  in  the  least 
forfeiting  acting  ability  or  a  capacity  for  identi- 

appeared  equally  for  charity  in  a  little  French  comedy  en- 
titled The  Spark.  To  be  complete,  I  must  yet  mention  a 
short  proverb  by  Hamilton  Aide,  produced  in  London  in  a 
reception  for  the  Prince  of  Wales  in  1883,  the  name  of  which 
has  escaped  my  memory. 

"But  Mme.  Modjeska  did  not  play  only  in  English  in 
America.  She  gave  two  consecutive  performances  in  Chicago 
in  Polish  for  charitable  purposes,  supported  by  a  company  of 
amateur  workingmen.  One  was  a  comic  part  in  a  popular 
peasant  comedy,  the  other  a  tragic  queen  in  a  historical 
drama.  Twice  also  she  played  in  French:  once  in  1884  in 
London  in  a  graceful  proverb  of  Augier  entitled  The  Post- 
sariptum;  she  was  supported  by  the  above-named  Pierre  Ber- 
ton.  The  second  time  she  acted  in  French  in  Los  Angeles  in 
1907  for  the  'French  Alliance'  in  that  beautiful  one-act 
drama  Le  Pater.  As  I  mentioned  her  several  charity  per- 
formances, I  may  be  allowed  to  remark  that  Mme.  Modjeska 
rarely  omitted  an  occasion  to  appear  for  charitable  objects. 
In  January,  1909,  about  ten  weeks  before  her  end,  already 
then  very  weak  and  ill,  she  took  part  in  a  great  benefit  per- 
formance for  the  victims  of  the  Messina  earthquake,  in  Los 
Angeles,  giving  the  sleepwalking  scene  of  Macbeth. 

"I  will  add  that  outside  of  the  twelve  Shakespearean 
plays  mentioned  by  you,  and  the  two  named  above  by  me, 
Madame  Modjeska  acted  in  Poland  in  two  more — Richard  III 
and  The  Taming  of  the  Shrew.  Her  repertoire  on  the  Polish 
stage  known  to  me  consisted  of  more  than  one  hundred  and 
ten  parts." 


HELENA  MODJESKA  85 

fying  herself  with  a  character,  Modjeska  was 
plainly  a  gracious  and  noble-spirited  woman. 
This  quality  came  over  the  footlights  to  her 
audience  and  was  one  of  the  secrets  of  her  ap- 
peal. '  <  To  mention  her  name,  as  the  years  drift 
away,  will  be  to  recall  a  presence  of  stately  dig- 
nity, of  tender  poetic  beauty,  of  exquisite  refine- 
ment, and  of  perfect  grace.  .  .  .  Her  ministra- 
tion as  an  actress  has  taught  again  the  old  and 
precious  lesson  that  poetry  is  not  a  dream. ' ' 23 

Modjeska 's  art  was  fine  tempered,  subtle, 
delicate.  She  was  not  physically  robust,  her 
voice  was  not  the  great  tragic  voice  of  a  Eachel, 
nor  had  it  the  thrilling  tones  of  a  Mary  Ander- 
son. And  there  was  always  between  her  and 
her  English  speaking  audiences  the  intangible 
film  of  difference  of  speech,  for  obviously  her 
pronunciation  could  never  be  perfect.  Yet  by  a 
genuinely  dramatic  insight  that  was  indisput- 
ably hers,  a  spontaneous  naturalness  of  word 
and  gesture,  and  her  great  power  of  quiet  in- 
tensity, she  achieved  a  forcefulness  far  beyond 
that  possible  to  mere  physical  and  vocal  effort. 

An  example  of  her  individual  quality  is  af- 
forded by  her  impersonation  of  the  heroine  of 
Camille.  In  the  hands  of  other  actresses 
the  play  had  seemed  ' '  a  piece  that  befogs  moral 
perceptions  and  perplexes  all  sentiments  of 
right  and  duty."  Yet  Modjeska's  Marguerite 
Gauthier  redeemed  the  play  and  made  its  hero- 
ine a  real  and  tragic  woman.  "As  we  think 
upon  it,"  said  William  Winter,  "there  rises  in 

23  William  Winter  in  the  New  York  Tribune. 


86         HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

fancy  a  lithe,  willowy  figure,  just  touched  with  a 
kind  of  strange  richness — and  whose  every 
movement  is  perfect  grace.  The  face  is  pallid 
with  sorrow ;  the  large,  dark,  liquid  eyes  are  full 
of  mournful  light ;  the  voice  pierces  to  the  heart 
in  its  tones  of  supplication,  and  vibrates  with 
a  nameless  thrill  of  despairing  agony.  This 
figure  obeys  in  every  motion  the  feeling  that 
possesses  it.  The  tumult  of  self-reproach,  the 
bitterness  of  doubt,  the  ecstasy  of  contented 
and  confiding  love,  the  mingled  torment  and 
sublimity  of  enforced  self-sacrifice,  the  devo- 
tion to  virtuous  purpose,  and  the  conflict  be- 
twixt earthly  hope  and  heavenly  resignation  are 
all  expressed  by  it  with  the  elements  of  absolute 
sincerity  and  in  a  form  responsive  to  the  nicest 
touch  of  the  guiding  thought  which  controls 
every  particle  of  the  work.  It  is  impossible  to 
recognize  with  too  much  acceptance  the  splendid 
mechanism  with  which  the  artiste  acts.  It  is  a 
network  of  movement,  attitudes,  gestures, 
pauses,  glances,  and  quiet,  indescribable,  subtle 
suggestions  which,  altogether,  is  faultless  in 
delicacy  and  superb  in  completeness."  This 
comes  from  one  who  watched  Modjeska's  career 
with  the  kindly  interest  of  a  friend,  but  it  states 
with  fairness,  if  with  enthusiasm,  the  distinct- 
ive qualities  of  Modjeska's  acting. 

Great,  however,  as  were  Modjeska's  achieve- 
ments as  a  tragic  actress,  it  was  in  Shakespear- 
ean comedy,  that,  in  the  opinion  of  many,  she 
succeeded  most  individually.  Hers  was  essen- 
tially the  imaginative  style  of  acting,  and  to 


HELENA  MODJESKA  87 

Eosalind,  Viola,  Beatrice  and  Portia  she  gave 
character  and  individuality  as  well  as  charm 
and  grace.  "To  get  out  of  myself, "  she  said 
of  her  work,  "to  forget  all  about  Helena  Mod- 
jeska,  to  throw  my  whole  soul  into  the  assumed 
character,  to  lead  its  life,  to  be  moved  by  its 
emotions,  thrilled  by  its  passions,  to  suffer  or 
rejoice, — in  one  word,  to  identify  myself  with 
it  and  reincarnate  another  soul  and  body,  this 
became  my  ideal,  the  goal  of  all  my  aspirations, 
and  at  the  same  time  the  enchantment  and  at- 
traction of  my  work."  Thus  her  Eosalind  and 
her  Viola  were  not  mere  graceful,  spirited 
women.  There  was,  besides,  an  idealization 
that  lifted  them  into  the  realm  of  poetry  and  a 
sense  of  impersonation  that  was  a  fitting  re- 
sponse to  the  imagination  with  which  the  char- 
acters were  conceived. 

With  Modjeska's  first  American  tour  began 
the  formation  of  that  circle  of  friendships  out- 
side the  theatre  that  would  alone  mark  her  as 
an  extraordinary  woman.  The  names  must 
suffice:  Longfellow,  Eichard  Watson  Gilder, 
Grant,  Sherman,  Henry  Watterson,  Eugene 
Field ;  and  in  Europe :  Tennyson,  Lowell,  Alma- 
Tadema,  Burne-Jones,  Watts,  Justin  McCarthy, 
George  Brandes,  Hans  von  Biilow.  With  Long- 
fellow, perhaps,  was  her  most  cherished  friend- 
ship. During  her  first  visit  to  Boston  he  called 
on  her  at  her  hotel  and  she  and  her  son  went  to 
his  house  in  Cambridge.  "I  said  I  would 
gladly  study  some  passages  from  his  poems  and 
recite  them  to  him,  and  I  mentioned  Hiawatha, 


88         HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

but  he  stopped  me  with  the  words:  'You  do 
not  want  to  waste  your  time  in  memorizing 
those  things,  and  don't  you  speak  of  Hiawatha, 
or  I  will  call  you  Mudjikiewis,  which,  by  the 
way,  sounds  somewhat  like  your  name.'  " 24 

It  was  Longfellow  who  urged  Modjeska  to 
act  in  London — the  very  summit  of  her  ambi- 
tion. When  in  1880  she  had  repeated  there 
her  American  success  he  wrote  to  her:  "Now 
I  can  add  my  congratulations  on  your  tri- 
umphal entry  into  London.  How  pleasant  it 
is  to  be  able  to  say,  'I  told  you  so!'  And  did 
I  not  tell  you  so?  Am  I  not  worthy  to  be 
counted  among  the  Minor  Prophets?  I  cannot 
tell  you  how  greatly  rejoiced  I  am  at  this  new 
success — this  new.  wreath  of  laurel. ' '  For  Lon- 
don was  immediately  won.  Public,  critics,  so- 
ciety and  fellow  actors  united  to  make  her  wel- 
come. 

Poland,  a  small  and  unhappy  country,  has 
done  more  than  its  share  in  furnishing  the 
world  with  artists.  With  some  of  the  most 
famous  of  them  Modjeska 's  name  is  curiously 
linked.  Paderewski,  during  her  visit  to  Poland 
in  1884,  used  to  come  to  visit  her.  He  was 
then  a  young  man  of  twenty-one  whom  it  was 
impossible  to  keep  away  from  the  piano.  She 
encouraged  him,  overcame  his  doubts  as  to  his 
fitness  for  a  public  career,  and  that  summer 
they  appeared  in  the  same  program  in  Cracow. 
They  were  friends  during  the  rest  of  her  life, 
and  it  was  Paderewski  who  in  1905  inspired  the 

24  Memories  and  Impressions, 


HELENA  MODJESKA  89 

great  farewell  testimonial  to  Modjeska  in  New 
York.  "The  first  encouraging  words  I  heard 
as  a  pianist, "  he  wrote,  "came  from  her  lips; 
the  first  successful  concert  I  had  in  my  life  was 
due  to  her  assistance."  It  was  she,  too,  who 
years  before,  in  a  Polish  mountain  summer  re- 
sort, first  brought  Jan  and  Eduard  de  Reszke 
before  an  audience.  They  were  both  then 
under  twenty. 

In  1893  Madame  Modjeska  was  one  of  four 
actresses25  who  addressed  the  Women's  Con- 
gress at  the  Chicago  World's  Columbian  Ex- 
position. Besides  her  appearance  before  the 
Congress  as  an  actress,  she  was  asked  to  speak 
on  another  occasion  as  a  representative  of  Po- 
land. The  women  who  were  expected  from 
Poland  evidently  feared  the  Czar's  displeasure 
in  case  they  spoke  frankly  concerning  their 
country,  and  failed  to  appear  in  Chicago.  But 
Modjeska  spoke  her  mind  freely  concerning  the 
grievances  of  the  Poles.  She  was  widely 
quoted  in  the  papers,  and  news  of  her  speech 
reached  St.  Petersburg.  Playing  two  years 
later  in  Poland,  she  was  about  to  act  in  Warsaw 
when  word  came  from  the  Russian  government 
forbidding  her  appearance.  Plans  were  made 
f or  an  engagement  in  St.  Petersburg  itself,  but 
at  the  last  moment,  when  large  sums  had  al- 
ready been  spent  in  preparation,  she  was  told 
that  her  appearance  in  the  capital  was  for- 
bidden. Shortly  afterwards  Modjeska  and  her 

25  The  others  being  Clara  Morris,  Georgia  Cayvan,  and  Julia 
Marlowe, 


90         HEROINES  OP  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

husband  were  ordered  to  leave  Warsaw,  and  an 
imperial  decree  was  issued  to  the  effect  that 
they  were  never  thereafter  to  enter  any  part  of 
the  Russian  territory.  Efforts  were  often 
made  to  obtain  permission  to  go  to  Warsaw,  but 
to  the  end  of  her  life  Modjeska  was  excluded 
from  the  Czar's  dominions.26 

In  April,  1905,  Madame  Modjeska,  then  living 
in  practical  retirement  in  California,  received  a 
letter  signed  by  a  number  of  authors,  fellow 
actors  and  artists  in  New  York  which  acknowl- 
edged in  affectionate  terms  their  debt  and  grati- 
tude for  her  career,  and  offered  her  a  public 
testimonial  in  New  York.  This  was  the  idea  of 
Paderewski,  who  had  visited  her  in  California 
but  a  short  time  before  and  like  many  others 
was  disturbed  by  the  lack  of  public  acclaim  with 
which  she  was  modestly  sinking  into  retire- 
ment.27 The  great  pianist,  much  to  his  distress, 

26  This  prohibition  did  not  apply  to  Austrian  or  Prussian 
Poland,  of  course,  and  she  afterwards  acted  more  than  once  in 
Cracow,  Lemberg,  and  Posen. 

27  "During  her   long  professional   career,   though   Modjeska 
was    'presented'    by    various    managers,    her    personal    repre- 
sentative was  her  husband,  Bozenta, — one  of  the  kindest,  most 
intellectual,   and  most  drolly   eccentric   men  it  has  been  my 
fortune  to  know.     Neither  he  nor  his  wife  was  judicious  in 
worldly   matters,   while — as   is   not   unusual   in   such   cases — 
both    thought   themselves   exceptionally   shrewd   and   capable. 
Their  professional  labors  were  abundantly  remunerative,  but, 
being    improvident    and    generous,    they    did   not    accumulate 
wealth.     The    close   of   Modjeska's    life,    contrasted   with    the 
brilliancy  of  her  career,  was  pathetic  and  forlorn.     I  called 
on  her,  a  few  months  before  her  death,  in  the  refuge,  a  little 
cottage,  she  had  found,  at  East  Newport.     The  great  actress 
greeted  me  with  gentle  kindness  and  presently,  as  though  my 
coming  had  reminded  her  of  other  days  and  scenes,  she  looked 


HELENA  MODJESKA  91 

was  prevented  by  an  accident  from  being  pres- 
ent, but  the  best  known  actors  appearing  in  New 
York  at  the  time  lent  their  services.  Modjeska 
herself  played  scenes  from  Macbeth  and 
Mary  Stuart.  Edmund  Clarence  Stedman 
presented  to  Madame  Modjeska  a  memorial 
scroll  bearing  signatures  of  her  many  friends, 
actors,  actresses,  and  her  "attached  votaries  in 
other  walks  of  life — all  made  associates, "  Mr. 
Stedman  said  in  addressing  her,  "by  their  de- 
light in  your  genius  and  career.  A  quarter- 
century  ago  you  came  to  us  from  a  land  invested 
with  traditions  of  valor,  beauty,  and  romance, 
from  the  brave  and  soulful  country  that  flashed 
its  sword  in  our  behalf  and  that  in  our  own 
times  enthralls  us  with  music,28  and  through 
you  with  impassioned  tenderness  and  artistic 
power.  The  felicities  of  art  are  limitless,  and, 
as  in  creations  of  our  master  playwright  you 
found  the  most  alluring  range  for  your  own 

about  the  small  narrow  room  in  which  we  were.  'Ah,  it  ees 
small,'  she  said,  'very  small,  this  place  of  ours.  But,  what 
of  that?  It  ees  large  enough  for  two  old  people  to  sit  in — 
and  wait.1  As  I  came  away  her  lovely  eyes  were  suffused 
with  tears.  She  looked  at  me  long  and  fixedly.  'Good-by, 
my  good  friend,'  was  all  she  said.  She  seemed  to  foresee  that 
it  was  our  last  parting." — (William  Winter,  The  Wallet  of 
Time.)  It  is  not  to  be  thought  from  this  that  Modjeska 
died  poor.  Of  the  vast  sum  (said  to  be  $800,000)  that  she 
c«arned  on  the  American  stage,  she  left  at  her  death  some- 
thing over  $100,000,  in  California  real  estate,  stocks  and 
bonds,  and  jewelry.  It  is  true,  however,  that  she  was  lav- 
ishly generous,  and  that  her  bounty  was  bestowed  in  many 
places,  private  and  public.  She  was  the  founder  of  an  in- 
dustrial school  for  girls  in  Cracow,  for  which  she  gave 
$100,000. 

28  A  reference  to  Sembrich  and  Paderewski. 


92        HEROINES  OP  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

powers,  so  your  fresh  impersonations  woke  in 
us  the  sense  of  '  some  thing  rich  and  strange.'  " 

Modjeska,  with  tears  in  her  eyes  and  her  voice 
breaking  with  emotion,  briefly  expressed  her 
gratitude. 

"Long  may  your  enviable  years  flow  on,"  Mr. 
Stedman  had  said.  But  it  was  only  four  years 
later  that  she  died,29  in  California,  where  she 
had  always  maintained  her  home,  in  a  beautiful 
country  place  she  called  Arden,  not  far  from  the 
scene  of  that  ill-starred  venture  which  after  all 
had  its  justification  in  giving  to  America  a  great 
actress.  She  was  buried  in  Cracow,  the  city  of 
her  birth. 

"Hail  to  thee  upon  thy  return  to  thy  last  rest- 
ing place,"  said  Michael  Tarasiewicz  at  her 
funeral,  "welcome  thou,  who  might  say  of  thy- 
self as  did  Countess  Idalia:  'I  am  here  as  a 
passing  angel.  I  have  let  thee  see  the  lightning 
and  disappeared  upon  the  firmament  of  the 
sky.'  .  .  .  For  thy  art,  for  thy  constant  work, 
for  that  thou  hast  never  become  renegade  to 
thy  ideal,  and  that,  in  perfecting  thy  soul,  thou 
hast  been  perfecting  the  soul  of  humanity,  be 
blessed." 

2»  April  8,  1909,  on  Bay  Island,  East  Newport,  California, 
whither  she  had  moved  from  "Arden"  but  a  few  months  be- 
fore. Her  final  appearance  on  the  stage  was  in  the  spring 
of  1907. 


Mr* 


ELLEX   TERRY 


ELLEN  TERRY 

THERE  was,  in  Sir  Walter  Scott's  day,  an 
actor  named  Daniel  Terry,  who  was  a 
part  proprietor  of  the  Adelphi  Theatre  in  Lon- 
don. He  was  furnished  funds  for  that  venture 
by  Sir  Walter,  and  according  to  Lockhart  en- 
joyed a  large  share  of  Scott's  regard  and  con- 
fidence. An  effort  has  sometimes  been  made  to 
identify  this  Terry  with  the  family  that  in  the 
latter  half  of  the  nineteenth  century  furnished 
England  with  some  of  her  most  accomplished 
stage  artists.  But  the  connection  was  one  of 
name  only,  for  Benjamin  Terry,  the  father  of 
Ellen,  was  the  son  of  an  Irish  builder,  and 
eloped  with  the  daughter  of  a  Scottish  minister. 
Benjamin  Terry  and  his  wife,  the  parents  of 
Ellen,  were  both  actors,  not  reckoned  among 
the  brilliant  stars  of  their  day,  but  respectably 
talented,  well-trained  actors  of  the  old  school, 
better  known  in  the  provinces  than  in  the 
metropolis.  Benjamin  Terry  was  "a  hand- 
some, fine-looking  brown-haired  man,"  and  his 
wife  "a  tall,  graceful  creature,  with  an  abun- 
dance of  fair  hair,  and  with  big  blue  eyes  set 
in  a  charming  face."  On  the  outlying  " cir- 
cuits," in  Edinburgh,  and  latejr  in  .the  London 


94         HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

company  of  Charles  Kean,  they  were  reason- 
ably successful  in  their  profession;  but  their 
distinction — and  a  sufficient  one  surely — is 
their  remarkable  family  of  sons  and  daughters. 
"Think  of  it,"  wrote  Clement  Scott;  "Kate, 
with  her  lovely  figure  and  comely  features; 
Ellen,  with  her  quite  indescribable  charm; 
Marion,  with  a  something  in  her  deeper,  more 
tender,  and  more  feminine  than  either  of  them ; 
Florence,  who  became  lovelier  as  a  woman  than 
as  a  girl;  and  the  brothers  Fred  and  Charles, 
both  splendid  specimens  of  the  athletic  English- 
man."1 

It  was  while  Benjamin  Terry  and  his  wife 
were  playing  in  Coventry  that,  on  February  27, 
1848,  their  second  daughter,  Ellen  Alicia,  was 
born.  Coventry  is  proud  of  the  fact,  and  there 
has  been  a  rather  brisk  dispute  as  to  which 
house  was  the  birthplace.2 

From  her  earliest  childhood,  Ellen  Terry 
knew  the  theatre  and  its  people.  She  was  not 
one  of  those  who,  like  Mary  Anderson  or  Mod- 
jeska,  are  forced  to  cherish  ambitions  in  secret, 
for  naturally  and  inevitably  the  theatre  ab- 

1  These  brothers  and  sisters  were  all  actors  or  actresses  ex- 
cept Charles,  who  was  a  stage  manager,  and  the  father  of  the 
actresses  Minnie  and  Beatrice  Terry.     Mr.  Scott  does  not  men- 
tion  another   brother — George — who  was   identified  with  the 
business  side  of  the  theatre.     Fred  Terry  married  the  actress 
Julia  Neilson,  and  their  daughter,  Phyllis  Neilson-Terry,  is 
today  among  the  most  promising  young  women  on  England's 
stage.    There  were  two  other  brothers,  Ben  and  Thomas,  and 
three  children  died — twelve  in  all. 

2  No.  5  Market  Street  makes  out  the  best  cage. 


ELLEN  TEERY  95 

sorbed  her.  She  and  her  sister  Kate,  four 
years  her  elder,  were  in  their  early  girlhood 
as  firmly  established  as  popular  favorites  as 
actresses  of  that  age  can  be. 

Ellen  Terry's  fame  has  exceeded  that  of  any 
other  of  Benjamin  Terry's  large  family,  but 
when  she  began  her  stage  career  she  was  natur- 
ally known  as  Kate  Terry's  little  sister.  Before 
Ellen  made  her  first  appearance,  at  the  age  of 
eight,  Kate  had  achieved  marked  success,  for 
a  child,  in  Charles  Kean's  company,  and  until 
she  was  twenty-three,  when  she  married  and  re- 
tired from  the  stage,  she  was  recognized  as  one 
of  England's  leading  actresses.  The  third  of 
the  Terry  sisters,  Marion,  and  the  youngest, 
Florence,  had  less  distinguished  but  creditable 
careers.  There  has  not  been  a  better  instance 
of  the  hereditary  beauty  and  talent  that  oc- 
casionally concentrate  in  theatrical  families. 

Benjamin  Terry  and  his  wife  became  mem- 
bers of  the  company  which  about  the  middle  of 
the  century  the  younger  Kean  gathered  at  the 
Princess's  Theatre.  Whatever  the  disappoint- 
ments of  Charles  Kean's  career,  he  was  ear- 
nestly devoted  to  his  art,  he  greatly  developed 
the  scenic  equipment  of  the  stage  of  his  day, 
and  he  made  the  Princess's  Theatre  an  ex- 
cellent school  of  acting. 

Benjamin  Terry  not  only  acted  parts  at  the 
Princess's,  but  assisted  with  the  productions 
and  stage-management.  Naturally  enough, 
when  Kean's  series  of  Shakespearean  revivals 


96        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

required  the  appearance  of  children,  the  young 
Terry  sisters  were  chosen.  They  had  received 
what  training  their  parents  could  give  them. 
"It  must  be  remembered, ' '  Ellen  Terry  long 
afterward  wrote,  *  '  that  my  sister  and  I  had  the 
advantage  of  exceedingly  clever  and  conscien- 
tious parents,  who  spared  no  pains  to  bring  out 
and  perfect  any  talents  that  we  possessed. 
My  father  was  a  very  charming  elocutionist, 
and  my  mother  read  Shakespeare  beautifully, 
and  they  both  were  very  fond  of  us  and  saw 
our  faults  with  eyes  of  love,  though  they  were 
unsparing  in  their  corrections.  And,  indeed, 
they  had  need  of  all  their  patience;  for  my 
own  part,  I  know  I  was  a  most  troublesome, 
wayward  pupil. "  Her  father  was  constantly 
calling  for  impromptu  rehearsals  of  her  lines — 
at  the  table,  in  the  street  or  'bus — whenever 
opportunity  came.  She  remembers  vividly  go- 
ing into  a  drug  store,  where  her  father  stood 
her  on  a  chair  to  say  her  part  for  the  propri- 
etor. 

Trained  for  the  stage  from  her  earliest  child- 
hood, and  destined  unquestioningly  for  the 
career  of  an  actress,  her  first  appearance  came 
and  went  so  much  as  a  matter  of  course  that 
there  has  remained  some  uncertainty  as  to  the 
date  and  part.  Miss  Terry  herself  declares 
for  April  28,  1856,  and  Mamillius,  in  The  Win- 
ter's Tale.  Much  painstaking  research  has 
been  applied  to  the  question,  confirming  her 
strong  impression.  Yet  Button  Cook  said  he 
remembered  seeing  Kate  and  Ellen  Terry  as 


ELLEN  TERRY  97 

the  two  princes  in  Richard  HI,  and  wrote: 
i  i  My  recollection  of  Ellen  Terry  dates  from  her 
impersonation  of  the  little  Duke  of  York.  She 
was  a  child  of  six,  or  thereabout,  slim  and 
dainty  of  form,  with  profuse  flaxen  curls,  and 
delicately  featured  face,  curiously  bright  and 
arch  of  expression;  and  she  won,  as  I  remem- 
ber, her  first  applause  when,  in  clear  resonant 
tones,  she  delivered  the  lines: 

'  Uncle,  my  brother  mocks  both  you  and  me ; 

Because  that  I  am  little,  like  an  ape, 

He  thinks  that  you  should  bear  me  on  your  shoulders ' 

Eichard's  representative  [Charles  Kean] 
meanwhile  scowling  wickedly  and  tugging  at 
his  gloves  desperately,  pursuant  to  paternal  ex- 
ample and  stage  tradition.  A  year  or  two  later 
and  the  baby  actress  was  representing  now 
Mainillius  and  now  Puck. ' ' 

Mr.  Cook's  recollection  is  not  borne  out  by 
the  play  bills,  however,  and  it  may  safely  be 
said  that  Ellen  Terry's  first  appearance  was 
as  Mamillius  when  she  was  eight  years  old.3 

3  Her  own  memory  is  perhaps  not  an  infallible  guide,  but  in 
a  characteristic  letter  (September  26,  1887)  to  Clement  Scott 
she  was  emphatic  enough:  "Mr.  Button  Cook's  statement  was 
inaccurate,  that's  all!  I  didn't  contradict  it,  although  asked 
to  do  so  by  my  father  at  the  time,  for  I  thought  it  of  little,  if 
of  any  interest.  The  very  first  time  I  ever  appeared  on  any 
stage  was  on  the  first  night  of  The  Winter's  Tale,  at  the 
Princess's  Theatre,  with  dear  Charles  Kean.  As  for  the  young 
princes, — them  unfortunate  little  men,  I  never  played — not 
neither  of  them — there.  What  a  cry  about  a  little  wool !  It's 
flattering  to  be  fussed  about,  but  'Fax  is  Fax!'" 


98        HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

•Miss  Terry  has  given  us  her  own  impressions 
of  her  first  night  as  Mamillius.  "How  my 
young  heart  swelled  with  pride — I  can  recall 
the  sensation  now — when  I  was  told  what  I  had 
to  do.  There  is  something  in  a  woman's  nature 
which  always  makes  her  recollect  how  she  was 
dressed  at  any  especially  eventful  moment  of 
her  life,  and  I  can  see  myself,  as  though  it  were 
yesterday,  in  my  little  red  and  white  coat — 
very  short — very  pink  silk  stockings,  and  a  row 
of  tight  sausage  curls — my  mother  was  always 
very  careful  that  they  should  be  in  perfect  order 
and  regularity — clustered  round  my  head.  A 
small  go-cart,  which  it  was  my  duty  to  drag 
about  the  stage,  was  also  a  keen  source  of 
pride,  and  a  great  trouble  to  me.  My  first 
dramatic  failure  dates  from  that  go-cart.  I 
was  told  to  run  about  with  it  on  the  stage,  and 
while  carrying  out  my  instructions  with  more 
vigor  than  discretion,  tripped  over  the  handle, 
and  down  I  came  on  my  back.  A  titter  ran 
through  the  house,  and  I  felt  that  my  career  as 
an  actress  was  ruined  forever.  Bitter  and  co- 
pious were  the  tears  I  shed — but  I  am  not  sure 
that  the  incident  has  materially  altered  the 
course  of  my  life."  4  The  Times  concluded  its 
review  of  the  production  with  the  words: 
"And  last — aye,  and  least  too — Miss  Ellen 

*  Another  childish  blunder  marks  Miss  Terry's  only  meet- 
ing with  the  great  actor  Macready.  She  accidentally  jostled 
him  while  running  to  her  dressing-room.  He  smiled  at  her 
apology,  and  said:  "Never  mind,  you  are  a  very  polite  little 
girl,  and  you  act  very  earnestly  and  speak  very  nicely." 


ELLEN  TERRY  99 

Terry  plays  the  boy  Mamillius  with  a  vivacious 
precocity  that  proves  her  a  worthy  relative  of 
her  sister  Miss  Kate." 

She  had  soon  played  not  only  Mamillius,  but 
also  Puck  in  A  Midsummer  Night's  Dream, 
Prince  Arthur  in  King  John,  Fleance  in  Mac- 
beth and  other  childish  parts  in  plays  less  well 
remembered.  "In  those  days,"  says  Miss 
Terry,  "I  was  cast  for  many  a  'dumb*  part. 
I  walked  on  in  The  Merchant  of  Venice  carry- 
ing a  basket  of  doves ;  in  Richard  II  I  climbed 
up  a  pole  in  the  street  scene;  in  Henri/  VIII 
I  was  'top  angeP  in  the  vision,  and  I  remember 
that  the  heat  of  the  gas  at  that  dizzy  height 
made  me  sick  at  the  dress  rehearsal !  I  was  a 
little  boy  ' cheering'  in  several  other  produc- 
tions. ...  In  The  Merchant  of  Venice  I  was 
firmly  convinced  that  the  basket  of  doves  which 
I  carried  on  my  shoulder  was  the  principal  at- 
traction of  the  scene  in  which  it  appeared. 
The  other  little  boys  and  girls  in  the  company 
regarded  those  doves  with  eyes  of  bitter  envy. 
One  little  chorus  boy,  especially,  though  lie 
professed  a  personal  devotion  of  the  tenderest 
kind  for  me,  could  never  quite  get  over  those 
doves." 

It  is  not  to  be  thought  that  the  young  Terry 
sisters  were  merely  attractive  and  clever  chil- 
dren. They  were  applauded,  wrote  Button 
Cook,  "not  simply  because  of  their  cleverness 
and  prettiness,  their  graces  of  aspect,  the  care- 
ful training  they  evidenced,  and  the  pains  they 


100      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

took,  but  because  of  the  leaven  of  genius  dis- 
cernible in  all  their  performances  —  they  were 
born  actresses.  .  .  .  Here  were  little  players 
who  could  not  merely  repeat  accurately  the 
words  they  had  learnt  by  rote,  but  could  impart 
sentiment  to  their  speeches,  could  identify 
themselves  with  the  characters  they  played, 
could  personate  and  portray.'' 

Thus  Ellen  Terry's  training  began  early  and 
rigorously.  "When  I  was  a  child,"  she  wrote 
long  afterwards,  "rehearsals  often  used  to  last 
until  four  or  five  in  the  morning.  What  weary 
work  it  was  to  be  sure!  My  poor  little  legs 
used  to  ache,  and  sometimes  I  could  hardly  keep 
my  eyes  open  when  I  was  on  the  stage.  Often 
I  used  to  creep  into  the  green-room,  and  there, 
curled  up  in  the  deep  recess  of  the  window, 
forget  myself,  my  troubles,  and  my  art  —  if  you 
can  talk  of  art  in  connection  with  a  child  of 
eight  —  in  a  delicious  sleep."  In  the  years  to 
come  Ellen  Terry  rose  to  distinction  first  of 
all  by  virtue  of  her  radiant,  charming  person- 
ality and  a  natural  gift  for  acting.  But  only 
less  important  has  been  the  infinitely  varied, 
toilsome  schooling  in  actual  experience,  thus 
so  early  begun.5 


Terry  relates  the  rise  and  fall  of  her  childish  vanity 
at  this  time:  "The  parts  we  play  influence  our  characters  to 
some  extent,  and  Puck  made  me  a  bit  of  a  romp.  I  grew 
vain  and  rather  'cocky/  and  it  was  just  as  well  that  during 
the  rehearsals  for  the  Christmas  pantomime  in  1857,  I  was 
tried  for  the  part  of  the  fairy  Dragonetta  and  rejected.  [The 
children's  parts  at  the  Princess's  were  assigned  after  com- 
petitive trials.  For  Mamilliua  "Nelly"  had  been  chosen  out 


ELLEN  TERRY  1W 

When  Ellen  was  twelve  Charles  Kean's  man- 
agement of  the  Princess 's  came  to  an  end.  Her 
parents  at  once  took  advantage  of  the  measure 
of  popularity  which  the  sisters  had  acquired 
and  presented  them  in  a  "drawing-room  enter- 
tainment.'7 It  consisted  of  two  short  plays  in 
which  Ellen  and  Kate  assumed  all  the  char- 
acters, of  both  sexes.  The  venture  was  a  suc- 
cess, and  the  little  troupe,  father,  mother,  two 
daughters  and  a  pianist,  traveled  far  and  wide 
throughout  the  Kingdom  for  more  than  two 
years,  driving  from  place  to  place  in  the  primi- 
tive style  of  strolling  players. 

Eeturning  to  London,  Ellen  Terry,  whose 

of  half  a  dozen  aspirants.]  I  believe  that  my  failure  was 
principally  due  to  the  fact  that  I  hadn't  flashing  eyes  and 
raven  hair — without  which,  as  every  one  knows,  no  bad  fairy 
can  hold  up  her  head  and  respect  herself  .  .  .  Only  the  ex- 
treme beauty  of  my  dress  as  the  maudlin  'good  fairy'  Golden- 
star,  consoled  me.  I  used  to  think  I  looked  beautiful  in  it. 
I  wore  a  trembling  star  in  my  forehead,  too,  which  was  enough 
to  upset  any  girl."  A  little  later :  "I  think  my  part  in  Pizarro 
saw  the  last  of  my  vanity.  I  was  a  worshiper  of  the  sun  and, 
in  a  pink  feather,  pink  swathings  of  muslin,  and  black  arms, 
I  was  again  struck  by  my  own  beauty.  I  grew  quite  attached 
to  the  looking  glass  which,  reflected  that  feather!  Then  sud- 
denly there  came  a  change.  I  began  to  see  the  whole  thing. 
My  attentive  watching  of  other  people  began  to  bear  fruit, 
and  the  labor  and  perseverance,  care  and  intelligence,  which 
had  gone  to  make  these  enormous  productions  dawned  on  my 
young  mind.  Up  to  this  time  I  had  loved  acting  because  it 
was  great  fun,  but  I  had  not  loved  the  grind.  After  I  began 
to  rehearse  Prince  Arthur  in  King  John,  I  understood  that  if 
I  did  not  worJc  I  could  not  act!  And  I  wanted  to  work.  I 
used  to  get  up  in  the  middle  of  the  night  and  watch  my  ges- 
tures in  the  glass.  I  used  to  try  my  voice  and  bring  it  up 
and  down  in  the  right  places.  And  all  my  vanity  fell  away 
from  me." 


.102     .HEROINES, OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

name  seems  already  to  have  been  fairly  well 
established,  had  a  part  at  the  Eoyalty  Theatre 
in  a  dreadful  play  founded  on  Sue's  Atar-Gull. 
It  was  her  role  in  this  gruesome  drama  to  ap- 
pear on  the  stage  wrapped  in  the  coils  of  a 
huge  serpent,  and  shrieking  the  terror  appro- 
priate to  the  situation.  This  was  at  least  an 
opportunity  for  one  kind  of  acting  and  Miss 
Terry  made  the  most  of  it.  The  contemporary 
accounts  show  that  she  shrieked  most  start- 
lingly  and  whole-heartedly. 

Kate  Terry  had  joined  the  stock  company  at 
Bristol,  and  there  Ellen,  when  she  was  fourteen, 
went  also.  For  a  year  she  had  the  sound  train- 
ing— the  best  an  actor  can  have — of  acting 
many  widely  varying  parts.  "If  I  had  to  de- 
scribe her  acting  in  those  days, ' '  wrote  a  mem- 
ber of  the  company,  "I  should  say  its  chief 
characteristic  was  a  vivacious  sauciness.  Her 
voice  already  had  some  of  the  rich  sympathetic 
quality  which  has  since  been  one  of  her  most 
distinctive  charms.  Although  only  in  the  first 
flush  of  a  joyous  girlhood,  she  was  yet  familiar 
enough  with  the  stage  to  be  absolutely  at  home 
on  it.  ...  We,  the  young  fellows  of  that  day, 
thought  she  was  "perfection ;  we  toasted  her  in 
our  necessarily  frugal  measures;  we  would 
gladly  have  been  her  hewers  of  wood  and  draw- 
ers of  water.  She  had  personal  charm  as  well 
as  histrionic  skill.  Her  smiles  were  very  sweet, 
but,  alack  for  all  of  us,  they  were  mathematic- 
ally impartial. "  During  this  stay  in  the  west 


ELLEN  TEKRY  103 

of  England  (the  Bristol  company  appeared  also 
at  Bath)  she  acted  a  wide  range  of  parts,  from 
Shakespeare  to  extravaganza.  The  training,  in 
quantity  and  variety,  which  was  afforded  by 
the  stock  companies  of  the  middle  of  the  last 
century,  cannot  easily  be  matched  to-day.  The 
theatrical  system  of  England  and  America  has 
been  revolutionized,  and  the  long  run,  the 
country-wide  tour,  the  specialized  actor,  have 
become  the  rule.  Only  within  the  last  few 
years,  as  in  the  rise  of  the  Irish  national 
theatre,  the  Manchester  Players,  and  the  up- 
ward trend  in  certain  American  stock  com- 
panies, can  we  see  something  of  a  return  to 
earlier  conditions. 

There  followed  a  year  in  London,  in  the  com- 
pany, headed  by  the  older  Sothern,  which  was 
playing  at  the  Haymarket.  She  was  but  fifteen, 
yet  the  Times  said :  ' '  She  is  now  matured  into 
one  of  the  happiest  specimens  of  what  the 
French  call  the  ingenue."  She  played  Ger- 
trude in  The  Little  Treasure,  Hero  in  Much 
Ado  about  Nothing,  Lady  Touchwood  in  The 
Belle's  Stratagem,  Julia  in  The  Rivals,  and  also 
Mary  Meredith  in  a  revival  of  Our  American 
Cousin,  in  which  Sothern  was  his  famous  other 
self,  Lord  Dundreary; — not  bad  for  fifteen! 

At  sixteen  came  one  of  those  sudden  and 
complete  absences  from  the  stage  that  have? 
strangely  marked  the  career  of  one  born  to  act. 
She  was  married  in  1864  to  George  Frederick 
Watts,  the  famous  artist.  He  was  thirty-one 


104      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

years  her  senior.  "Watts  was  a  man.  of  great 
nobility  of  character,  he  cared  for  her  deeply, 
and  the  brief  period  of  her  life  with  him  she 
herself  declared  not  wholly  unhappy.  Yet  the 
marriage  was  a  mistake.  Though  she  responded 
to  the  beauty  and  peace  of  her  new  surround- 
ings, and  for  a  while  at  least  was  contented  to 
forget  the  theatre,  she  was  little  more  than  a 
child — exuberant,  unused  to  the  restraint  of  a 
quiet  country  home ;  and  she  had  tasted  success. 
The  artist  himself  was  oppressed  with  a  feel- 
ing that  he  had  spoiled  her  life.  In  any  event 
they  soon  separated,  and  she  met  him  only  once 
thereafter,  though  years  later  they  exchanged 
friendly  letters. 

When  she  was  nearing  twenty  Ellen  Terry 
returned  to  the  stage,  more  or  less  under  the 
direction  of  Charles  Eeade,  the  famous  novel- 
ist, then  part  manager  of  the  Queen's.  One  of 
the  best  of  English  novelists  of  the  second  de- 
gree, his  main  artistic  interest  was  the  theatre, 
and  he  was,  mistakenly,  more  ambitious  of  fame 
as  a  dramatist  than  as  a  novelist.  His  play  The 
Double  Marriage  was  founded  on  his  novel 
White  Lies.  It  was  well  acted  (Ellen  Terry 
playing  the  heroine),  and  well  mounted,  but  a 
failure.  Charles  Eeade 's  oft-quoted  descrip- 
tion of  Ellen  Terry  in  a  way  characterizes  them 
both,  the  charming  actress  and  the  brusque, 
facile  writer:  "Her  eyes  are  pale,  her  nose 
rather  long,  her  mouth  nothing  particular,  com- 
plexion a  delicate  brick-dust,  her  hair  rather 
like  tow.  Yet  somehow  she  is  beautiful.  Her 


ELLEN  TERRY  105 

expression  kills  any  pretty  face  you  see  beside 
her.  Her  figure  is  lean  and  bony;  her  hands 
masculine  in  size  and  form.  Yet  she  is  a  pat- 
tern of  fawn-like  grace.  Whether  in  move- 
ment or  repose,  grace  pervades  the  hussy. " 
The  two  were  to  be  excellent,  even  affectionate, 
friends. 

The  most  noteworthy  event  of  this  brief  en- 
gagement at  the  Queen's  was  her  first  appear- 
ance with  Henry  Irving,  then  of  course  a  rising 
actor,  not  yet  the  distinguished  manager  of 
later  days.  The  play  was  Garrick's  "muti- 
lation" of  The  Taming  of  the  Shrew  which  he 
called  Katherine  and  Petruchio.  Of  this  fore- 
shadowing of  what  was  to  be,  Miss  Terry 
writes:  "There  is  an  old  story  told  of  Mr. 
Irving  being  '  struck  with  my  talent  at  this  time 
and  promising  that  if  he  ever  had  a  theatre  of 
his  own  he'd  give  me  an  engagement!'  But 
that  is  all  moonshine.  As  a  matter  of  fact 
I'm  sure  he  never  thought  of  me  at  all  at  that 
time.  I  was  just  then  acting  very  badly,  and 
feeling  ill,  caring  scarcely  at  all  for  my  work 
or  a  theatre,  or  anybody  belonging  to  a  the- 
atre." And  again:  "From  the  first  I  no- 
ticed that  Mr.  Irving  worked  more  concen- 
tratedly  than  all  the  other  actors  put  together, 
and  the  most  important  lesson  of  my  working 
life  I  learnt  from  him,  that  to  do  one's  work 
well  one  must  work  continually,  live  a  life  of 
constant  self-denial  for  that  purpose,  and,  in 
short,  keep  one's  nose  upon  the  grindstone." 
Of  her  performance  in  the  pseudo-Shake- 


106       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

spearean  piece  the  critics  varied.  "I  have  not 
much  recollection  of  the  performance, "  wrote 
Clement  Scott,  "save  that  Ellen  Terry  was  the 
sweetest  shrew  ever  seen  and  that  it  seemed 
barbaric  to  crack  a  whip  in  her  presence." 

After  acting  for  about  a  year  at  the  Queen's, 
Miss  Terry  again  retired  from  the  stage,  this 
time  for  six  years.  She  disappeared  from  Lon- 
don and  the  stage  and  wholeheartedly  gave  her- 
self up  to  a  tranquil  domestic  life  in  the  coun- 
try. This  was  the  period  of  her  union  with 
Charles  Wardell,  her  second  husband,  an  ex- 
cellent actor  known  to  playgoers  as  Charles 
Kelly.  Of  this  union  there  have  been  two 
children,  Ailsa  Craig,  who  played  small  parts 
at  the  Lyceum  with  her  mother  and  Henry 
Irving,  and  Gordon  Craig,  who,  first  an  actor, 
is  today  recognized  as  one  of  the  most  impor- 
tant and  fertile  workers  toward  a  new  art  of 
stage  setting. 

"I  led  a  most  unconventional  life,"  writes 
Miss  Terry, ' '  and  experienced  exquisite  delight 
from  the  mere  fact  of  being  in  the  country.  No 
one  knows  what  'the  country'  means  until  he 
or  she  has  lived  in  it.  '  Then,  if  ever,  come  per- 
fect days.'  .  .  .  For  the  first  time  I  was  able 
to  put  all  my  energies  into  living.  ...  I  began 
gardening,  'the  purest  of  human  pleasures'; 
I  learned  to  cook,  and  in  time  cooked  very 
well,  though  my  first  essay  in  that  difficult  art 
was  rewarded  with  dire  and  complete  fail- 
ure.6 

«  "It  was  a  chicken !     Now,  as  all  the  chickens  had  names — 


ELLEN  TERRY  107 

"My  hour  of  rising  at  this  pleasant  place 
near  Mackery  End  in  Hertfordshire  was  six. 
Then  I  washed  the  babies.  I  had  a  perfect 
mania  for  washing  everything  and  everybody. 
We  had  one  little  servant,  and  I  insisted  on 
washing  her  head.  Her  mother  came  up  from 
the  village  to  protest.  l  Never  washed  her  head 
in  my  life.  Never  washed  any  of  my  children's 
heads.' 

i '  After  the  washing  I  fed  the  animals.  There 
were  two  hundred  ducks  and  fowls  to  feed,  as 
well  as  the  children.  By  the  time  I  had  done 
this,  and  cooked  the  dinner,  the  morning  had 
flown  away.  After  the  midday  meal  I  sewed. 
Sometimes  I  drove  out  in  the  pony-cart.  And 
in  the  evening  I  walked  across  the  common  to 
fetch  the  milk.  The  babies  used  to  roam  where 
they  liked  on  this  common  in  charge  of  a  bull- 
dog, while  I  sat  and  read.  I  studied  cookery- 
Sultan,  Duke,  Lord  Tom  Noddy,  Lady  Teazle,  and  so  forth—- 
and as  I  was  very  proud  of  them  as  living  birds,  it  was  a 
great  wrench  to  kill  one  at  all,  to  start  with.  It  was  the 
murder  of  Sultan,  not  the  killing  of  a  chicken.  However,  at 
last  it  was  done,  and  Sultan  deprived  of  his  feathers,  floured, 
and  trussed.  I  had  no  idea  how  this  was  all  done,  but  I  tried 
to  make  him  'sit  up'  nicely  like  the  chickens  in  the  shops. 

"He  came  up  to  the  table  looking  magnificent — almost  tur- 
key-like in  his  proportions. 

"  'Hasn't  this  chicken  rather  an  odd  smell?  '  said  our  visitor. 

"  'How  can  you ! '  I  answered.  'It  must  be  quite  fresh — it's 
Sultan!' 

"However,  when  we  began  to  carve,  the  smell  grew  more 
and  more  potent. 

"/  had  cooked  Sultan  without  taking  out  his  in'ards! 

"There  was  no  dinner  that  day  except  bread-sauce,  beauti- 
fully made,  well-cooked  vegetables,  and  pastry  like  the  foam 
of  the  sea.  I  had  a  wonderful  hand  for  pastry." 


108       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

books  instead  of  parts — Mrs.  Beeton  instead 
of  Shakespeare! 

"Oh,  blissful  quiet  days!  How  soon  they 
came  to  an  end !  Already  the  shadow  of  finan- 
cial trouble  fell  across  my  peace.  Yet  still  I 
never  thought  of  returning  to  the  stage. 

"One  day  I  was  driving  in  a  narrow  lane, 
when  the  wheel  of  the  pony-cart  came  off.  I 
was  standing  there,  thinking  what  I  should  do 
next,  when  a  whole  crowd  of  horsemen  in  'pink' 
came  leaping  over  the  hedge  into  the  lane.  One 
of  them  stopped  and  asked  if  he  could  do  any- 
thing. Then  he  looked  hard  at  me  and  ex- 
claimed: 'Good  God!  It's  Nelly!'  The  man 
was  Charles  Eeade. 

"  'Where  have  you  been  all  these  years?' 
he  said. 

"  'I  have  been  having  a  very  happy  time/ 
I  answered. 

"  'Well,  you've  had  it  long  enough.  Come 
back  to  the  stage!' 

"  'No,  never!' 

"  'You're  a  fool!    You  ought  to  come  back.' 

"Suddenly  I  remembered  the  bailiff  in  the 
house  a  few  miles  away,  and  I  said  laughingly : 
'Well,  perhaps  I  would  think  of  it  if  someone 
would  give  me  forty  pounds  a  week!' 

"  'Done!'  said  Charles  Reade.  'I'll  give  you 
that,  and  more,  if  you'll  come  and  play  Philippa 
Chester  in  The  Wandering  Heir.' 

Thus  it  was  "dear,  lovable,  aggravating, 
childlike,  crafty,  gentle,  obstinate,  and  entirely 


ELLEN  TERRY  109 

delightful  and  interesting  Charles  Keade,"  to 
use  Ellen  Terry 's  own  characterization,  who  in 
1874  induced  her  to  return  to  the  stage.  He 
was  then  managing  the  Queen's.  Since  1868 
she  had  not  acted  at  all,  but  she  was  well  re- 
membered, and  her  reappearance  was  cordially 
welcomed.  The  play  was  one  of  Beade's 
own,  The  Wandering  Htir,  and  in  course  of  it 
Miss  Terry  appeared  in  male  attire — one  of 
the  few  times  she  had  what  old  timers  used 
to  know  as  "breeches  parts."  From  all  ac- 
counts it  was  a  buoyant,  charming  imperson- 
ation. The  author  complimented  her  on  her 
self-denial  in  making  what  he  called  "some 
sacrifice  of  beauty  to  pass  for  a  boy,  so  that 
the  audience  can't  say:  'Why,  James  must 
be  a  fool  not  to  see  she  is  a  girl.' 

From  this  time,  in  1874,  until  more  than 
thirty  years  later,  Ellen  Terry  was  continu- 
ously before  the  public.  In  1875,  S.  B.  Ban- 
croft (later  Sir  Squire) — one  of  the  ablest 
actor-managers  of  the  day — determined  upon 
a  daring  experiment  at  his  little  Prince  of 
Wales 's  Theatre,  a  bandbox  of  a  theatre  hitherto 
dedicated  to  the  "teacup  and  saucer  drama." 
This  was  his  production  of  The  Merchant  of 
Venice.  The  play  has  never  been  set  more 
beautifully,  and  as  we  shall  see,  it  was  in  one 
part  acted  to  perfection.  But  it  failed  through 
the  failure  of  Charles  Coghlan  as  Shylock. 
For  Ellen  Terry,  however,  it  was  really  the 
first  great  triumph  of  her  career.  For  her 


110      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Portia  on  this  occasion  was  a  real  triumph. 
She  was  twenty-seven,  in  the  very  perfection 
of  her  youth  and  beauty,  and  it  was  her  first 
important  venture  with  a  Shakespearean  part. 
Her  success  was  immediate,  and  Portia,  in  the 
minds  of  many,  always  remained  her  most 
charming  and  characteristic  impersonation.7 
"Success  I  had  had  of  a  kind,  and  I  had  tasted 
the  delight  of  knowing  that  audiences  liked  me, 
and  had  liked  them  back  again !  But  never  un- 
til I  appeared  as  Portia  at  the  Prince  of  Wales 's 
had  I  experienced  that  awe-struck  feeling  which 
comes,  I  suppose,  to  no  actress  more  than  once 
in  a  lifetime — the  feeling  of  the  conqueror.  In 
homely  parlance,  I  knew  that  I  had  'got  them' 
at  the  moment  when  I  spoke  the  speech  begin- 
ning: 'You  see  me,  Lord  Bassanio,  where  I 
stand.'  'What  can  this  be!'  I  thought.  'Quite 
this  thing  has  never  come  to  me  before.'  It 
was  never  to  be  quite  the  same  again.  Elation, 
triumph,  being  lifted  on  high  by  a  single  stroke 
of  the  mighty  wing  of  glory — call  it  by  any 

7  Of  her  first  night  as  Portia  the  London  Daily  News  said : 
"This  is  indeed  the  Portia  that  Shakespeare  drew.  The  bold 
innocence,  the  lively  wit  and  quick  intelligence,  the  grace  and 
elegance  of  manner,  and  all  the  youth  and  freshness  of  this 
exquisite  creation  can  rarely  have  been  depicted  in  such  har- 
monious combination.  Nor  is  this  delightful  actress  less  suc- 
cessful in  indicating  the  tenderness  and  depth  of  passion 
which  lie  under  that  frolicsome  exterior.  Miss  Terry's  figure, 
at  once  graceful  and  commanding,  and  her  singularly  sweet 
and  expressive  countenance,  doubtless  aid  her  much;  but  this 
performance  is  essentially  artistic,  ...  in  the  style  of  art 
which  cannot  be  taught." 


ELLEN  TERRY  111 

name — it  was  as  Portia  that  I  had  my  first  and 
last  sense  of  it." 

In  spite  of  Miss  Terry's  personal  success, 
the  Bancrofts'  splendid  revival  of  The  Mer- 
chant of  Venice  was  short  lived.  Its  thirty- 
six  performances  served,  however,  to  lay  firmly 
the  foundations  of  Ellen  Terry's  fame.  Only 
three  years  were  to  elapse  before  she  made  her 
epoch-making  association  with  Henry  Irving. 
She  spent  first  a  year  with  the  Bancrofts,  help- 
ing them  give  life  to  a  group  of  already  old- 
fashioned  dramas,  Money,  The  Lady  of  Lyons, 
Masks  and  Faces,  and  Ours.  "She  enacted 
Clara  Douglas  and  Pauline  as  well  as  they  have 
been  ever  played  in  our  time,  and  showed  us 
that  the  staginess  of  the  stagiest  of  old  plays 
can  be  eliminated  by  acting  so  sincere  and  nat- 
ural as  that  of  Ellen  Terry."  8 

Then  came,  in  John  Hare's  company  at  the 
Court  Theatre,  where  the  other  members  in- 
cluded her  husband  and  Charles  Coghlan  (be- 
sides Mr.  Hare  himself),  two  years  remarkable 
chiefly  for  Olivia.  The  success  of  Mr.  Hare's 
venture  was  doubtful,  when  suddenly  a  happy 
idea  came  to  him, — a  play  made  from  The 
Vicar  of  WaJcefield.  It  was  a  time  of  enthusi- 
asm for  the  eighteenth  century.  "We  were  all 
mad  about  blue  china,  Chippendale  chairs,  Sher- 
aton sideboards,  old  spinets,  and  brass  fire 
irons,"  says  one  writer.  "The  age  was  exactly 
ripe  for  The  Vicar  of  Wakefield,  and  John 

•  Clement  Scott. 


112      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Hare,  with  his  keen  instinct,  pictured  in  Ms 
mind 's  eye  an  ideal  Olivia  in  Ellen  Terry. ' '  W. 
G.  Wills  made  the  play,  and  made  it  well.  Play, 
setting,  and  acting  conspired  to  make  Olivia 
one  of  the  best  examples  of  the  "play  of  a  pe- 
riod." As  Olivia  herself  Ellen  Terry  was  su- 
premely successful  and  appealing.  Among  her 
non-Shakespearean  characters  it  undoubtedly 
stands  first,  and  for  her  sake  Olivia  was  in- 
troduced into  the  Lyceum  repertoire,  and  acted 
by  Irving  and  Terry  for  many  years. 

It  was  her  acting  in  this  part,  indeed,  that 
immediately  preceded  and  to  a  degree  occa- 
sioned her  becoming  the  chief  support  of  Henry 
Irving,  who  just  at  this  time  (1878)  became 
manager  of  the  Lyceum  Theatre.  Irving 's  am- 
bition to  gather  the  best  possible  company  made 
the  choice  natural,  inevitable  indeed.  She  had 
just  turned  thirty,  she  was  temperamentally 
fitted  to  complement  his  own  peculiarly  mag- 
netic personality,  she  was  thoroughly  accom- 
plished, and  she  was  already  universally  popu- 
lar. It  is  a  question,  as  says  Clement  Scott, 
"how  much  of  Henry  Irving 's  success  was  due 
at  the  outset  to  the  extraordinary  influence, 
charm,  and  fascination  of  Ellen  Terry. "  They 
were  one  in  their  enthusiasm  for  their  art,  and 
they  were  alike  in  their  artistic  prejudices. 
Like  Irving,  she  was  devoted  to  the  poetic  and 
romantic  drama,  as  opposed  to  the  realistic, 
psychological  drama  of  modern  life.9 

Henry  Irving  and  Ellen   Terry   acted  to- 

»  Ellen   Terry   dismisses   Ibsen's   women    as   "silly   ladies," 


ELLEN  TEKRY  113 

gether  for  twenty-four  years.  One  is  used  to 
being  told  that  the  Irving  regime  at  the  Lyceum 
constituted  the  most  brilliant  period  of  the  Eng- 
lish stage  during  the  latter  half  of  the  nine- 
teenth century.  Brilliant  it  certainly  was — a 
splendidly  successful,  dignified  campaign  in 
fostering  the  best  English  stage  traditions. 
Yet  one  cannot  but  sympathize  with  George 
Bernard  Shaw's  regret  that  Ellen  Terry  did 
not  retire  from  Irving 's  company  sooner  than 
she  did.  "I  have  never  made  a  secret  of  my 
opinion,"  wrote  Shaw,  "that  the  Lyceum  un- 
dertaking, celebrated  as  it  was,  involved,  when 
looked  at  from  the  purely  dramatic  side  of  the 
stage  art,  a  most  deplorable  waste  of  two  of  the 
most  remarkable  talents  of  the  end  of  the  last 
century."  What  Mr.  Shaw  objected  to  was 
the  exclusion  from  the  Lyceum  repertoire  of 
modern,  radical  dramatists,  such  as  Ibsen, 
Hauptmann,  and  doubtless  Mr.  Shaw  himself. 
But  while  he  thought  that  Irving  used  Shakes- 
peare's plays  not  to  interpret  the  dramatist's 
characters  but  as  frames  for  figures  which  were 
creations  of  the  actor's  imagination,  Mr.  Shaw 
must  needs  say  of  Ellen  Terry  that  "  she  under- 
stood Shakespeare,  and  knew  how  to  imper- 
sonate Beatrice,  Juliet,  Imogen  and  the  rest, 
intelligently,  charmingly,  exactly  as  they  must 
have  appeared  to  Shakespeare  in  his  mind's 
eye."  And  it  is  probably  true  that  Ellen 
Terry,  devoted  as  she  was  to  her  " lovely  art," 

"drawn  in  straight  lines,"  and  easy  to  play;  a  characteristic, 
if  radically  unjustified  view. 


114       HEEOINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

as  she  called  it,  was  not  more  than  casually  in- 
terested in  the  development  of  the  allied  art, 
that  of  the  dramatist.  She  disliked  Ibsen,  and 
had  no  desire  for  his  sake  to  desert  the  Lyceum. 
"Why  did  she  remain  so  long?"  asks  Mr.  Shaw, 
and  replying  to  himself:  "The  answer  is 
found  in  the  fact  that  the  Lyceum,  while  it  did 
not  call  her  dramatic  faculties  into  full  play, 
gave  the  widest  scope  for  the  full  development 
of  a  wonderful  sense  of  the  picturesque. "  In 
other  words,  she  was  attracted  by  the  roman- 
tic rather  than  the  realistic,  the  poetic  rather 
than  the  psychological. 

We  have  traced  the  important  steps  of  her 
rise  to  a  high  place  in  her  profession.  How 
might  one  account  for  the  personal  element  in 
this  success? — for,  trained  and  accomplished 
artist  as  she  was,  personality  counted  heavily 
in  this  progress.  Well,  there  has  been,  can  be, 
but  one  Ellen  Terry.  In  writing  of  her  power- 
ful charm  the  words  of  strong  men  have  run 
riot.  "I  never  saw  a  more  enchanting  and 
ideal  creature,"  wrote  Clement  Scott  of  her 
later  girlhood.  "She  was  a  poem  that  lived 
and  breathed,  and  suggested  to  us  the  girl  hero- 
ines that  we  most  adored  in  poetry  and  the  fine 
arts  generally.  Later  on,  as  we  all  know,  El- 
len Terry  played  Queen  Guinevere ;  but  at  this 
period  she  was  i  Elaine  the  fair,  Elaine  the  love- 
able,  Elaine  the  Lily  Maid  of  Astolat. '  .  .  .  She 
was  the  Porphyria  of  Robert  Browning  and 
surely  one  of  the  crowned  queens  in  the  Morte 
d' Arthur.  I  wish  I  could  paint  with  pen  an 


ELLEN  TERRY  115 

even  vague  suggestion  of  this  enchanting  per- 
sonality, tall,  fair,  willowy,  with  hair  like  spun 
gold,  a  faultless  complexion,  the  very  poetry  of 
movement,  with  that  wonderful  deep-toned 
voice  that  has  a  heart-throb  in  it."  If  in  her 
'teens  Ellen  Terry  was  "ideal,  mystical, 
mediaeval,"  and  suggested  Elaine  and  Undine, 
who  that  ever  saw  her,  in  her  later  career,  as 
Olivia,  but  saw  realized  in  flesh  and  blood  the 
ideal  of  English  beauty? 

"The  role  which  she  played  in  the  life  of 
her  times,"  says  Mr.  Shaw,  "can  only  be 
properly  estimated  when  (perhaps  fifty  years 
hence)  her  letters  will  be  collected  and  pub- 
lished in  twenty  or  thirty  volumes.10  Then,  I 
think,  we  shall  discover  that  every  celebrated 
man  of  the  last  quarter  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury had  been  in  love  with  Ellen  Terry,  and 
that  many  of  these  men  had  found  in  her  friend- 
ship the  best  return  that  could  be  expected  from 
a  gifted,  brilliant  and  beautiful  woman,  whose 
love  had  already  been  given  elsewhere."  And 
not  only  celebrated  men.  There  have  been 
countless  lowly,  unknown  devotees.  "That 
much-used  word  'only7  can  be  used  literally  in 
regard  to  Ellen  Terry,"  again  says  Mr.  Shaw 
with  unusual  enthusiasm.  "If  Shakespeare 
had  met  Irving  on  the  street  he  would  have 
recognized  in  him  immediately  a  distinguished 
type  of  the  family  of  artists;  if  he  had  met 

10  "She  has  always  been  an  indefatigable  and  charming  letter- 
writer,  one  of  the  greatest  letter  writers  that  ever  lived,"  says 
Mr.  Shaw,  the  happy  recipient  of  many  of  her  letters. 


116       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Ellen  Terry  he  would  have  stared  at  her  as 
at  a  new  and  irresistibly  charming  type  of 
woman. ' ' 

It  seems  clear  that  Ellen  Terry's  success  was 
after  all  one  largely  of  personality.  She  was 
splendidly  successful,  and  no  one  could  for  a 
moment  deny  the  fascinating  beauty  of  most 
of  her  acting.  Yet  was  she  of  the  first  flight  of 
artists?  It  is  difficult  to  answer  Yes.  Her 
Portia  and  her  Beatrice  were  the  finest  of  her 
time,  probably  the  finest  the  stage  has  yet  seen ; 
her  Olivia  was  a  lovely,  indeed  a  perfect,  reali- 
zation of  Goldsmith's  heroine,  and  in  many  an- 
other character  she  charmed  and  moved  her 
hearers.  Yet  when  all  is  said  and  done  Ellen 
Terry,  in  her  most  successful  parts,  was  simply 
her  glorified  self.  It  is  probably  true — though 
the  question  was  never  thoroughly  put  to  the 
test— that  she  lacked  that  power,  reserved  for 
the  artist  of  first  rank,  of  identifying  herself 
equally  well  with  widely  differing  characters. 
True  tragedy  lay  beyond  her.  Charles  Eeade, 
at  one  time  a  constant  and  helpful  critic  of  her 
acting,  told  her  that  she  was  capable  of  any 
effect,  provided  it  was  not  sustained  too  long. 
"A  truer  word  was  never  spoken,"  says  Miss 
Terry.  "It  has  never  been  in  my  power  to 
sustain.  In  private  life,  I  cannot  sustain  a 
hatred  or  a  resentment.  On  the  stage,  I  can 
pass  swiftly  from  one  effect  to  another,  but  I 
cannot  fix  one,  and  dwell  on  it,  with  that  superb 
concentration  which  seems  to  me  the  special 
attribute  of  the  tragic  actress.  To  sustain, 


ELLEN  TERRY  11? 

with  me,  is  to  lose  the  impression  that  I  have 
created,  not  to  increase  its  intensity. "  Always 
of  a  volatile,  light-hearted  temperament  in  her 
own  self,  the  acting  of  tragedy  was  with  her 
more  a  matter  of  routine  duty  than  the  natural 
response  of  her  nature. 

But  let  us  not  seem  to  require  too  much  of  a 
providence  that  vouchsafes  so  rarely  an  Ellen 
Terry.  If  criticism,  when  the  final  estimate  is 
written,  is  forced  to  recognize  in  her  a  circum- 
scribed talent,  we  who  have  seen  her  would  not 
have  had  her  otherwise  than  as  she  was.  And 
if  one  says  she  was  not  truly  a  great  artist,  an- 
other may  reply  truthfully  that  with  her  art 
was  second,  life  itself  first.  "In  contrast  to 
Irving,  to  whom  his  art  was  everything  and  his 
life  nothing,  she  has  found  life  itself  more  in- 
teresting than  art,"  says  George  Bernard 
Shaw.  "And  while  she  was  associated  with 
him  in  his  long  and  brilliant  management  of 
the  Lyceum  Theatre  she — the  most  modern  of 
modern  women — considered  it  a  higher  honor 
to  be  an  economic,  exemplary  housewife  than 
to  be  a  self-conscious  woman,  whose  highest 
aim  was  to  play  the  heroine  in  the  old-fashioned 
plays  in  which  Irving  shone. "  Again,  she 
lacked  that  all-sacrificing  ambition  that  carries 
the  artist  to  the  topmost  heights.  During  her 
two  absences  from  the  stage,  and  especially 
during  the  second,  when  she  spent  six  years  in 
the  country,  happy  as  housewife  and  mother, 
she  had  no  regrets  for  the  stage,  no  longing  for 
its  triumphs.  And  she  was  throughout  her 


118      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

career  content  to  be  a  "useful"  actress.  She 
constantly  uses  that  word.  She  was  content, 
first  with  private  life,  then  with  her  ability  to 
help  the  artistic  cause  of  Henry  Irving. 

Never  has  there  been  a  better  example  than 
Ellen  Terry  of  the  blending  of  trained  acting 
ability  with  untamed  high  spirits.  Her  acting 
was  sure  of  its  effects  and  yet  shot  through 
with  gleams  of  her  own  radiant  charm  and  ex- 
uberance. And  off  the  stage  as  well  she  was 
this  same  blithe  spirit.  It  was  strange  that 
she  disliked  the  elder  Sothern,  for  if  he  had 
his  equal  in  practical  joking,  it  was  in  Ellen 
Terry.  She  was  thirty  when  she  joined  Irving. 
Yet  one  day  when  he  came  to  the  foot  of  the 
stairs  leading  to  her  dressing  room,  he  looked 
up  to  see  his  new  leading  woman  sliding  down 
the  banisters !  The  act  was  characteristic,  and 
so  is  her  comment:  "I  remember  feeling 
as  if  I  had  laughed  in  church.  .  .  .  He  smiled 
at  me  but  didn't  seem  able  to  get  over  it." 
But  sunny  as  she  was,  she  could  weep  too. 
When  playing  Olivia,  she  generally  wept,  she 
says,  for  the  part  touched  her  more  than  any 
other.  "I  cried  too  much  in  it,  just  as  I  cried 
too  much  later  on  in  Hamlet,  and  in  the  last 
act  of  Charles  7.  My  real  tears  on  the  stage 
have  astonished  some  people,  and  have  been 
the  envy  of  others,  but  they  have  often  been 
a  hindrance  to  me.  I  have  had  to  work  to  re- 
strain them."  She  was  occasionally  oversen- 
sitive to  adverse  criticism.  When  a  writer  in 
Blackwood's  said  she  showed  plainly  that 


ELLEN  TERRY  119 

Portia  loves  Bassanio  before  lie  has  actually 
won  her,  Miss  Terry  was,  she  says,  for  years 
made  uneasy  and  lacking  in  sureness  at  this 
moment  in  the  play.  "Any  suggestion  of  in- 
delicacy in  my  treatment  of  a  part, ' '  she  wrote, 
"always  blighted  me." 

To  trace  in  detail  the  history  of  "Irving  and 
Terry"  would  be  tedious.  They  acted  together 
from  1878  to  1902.  Their  half  dozen  Ameri- 
can tours  aroused  the  same  enthusiasm  and  loy- 
alty that  during  all  that  long  period  was  their 
portion  at  home.11  Her  retirement  is  so  recent 
that  the  actress's  Portia,  her  Beatrice,  Juliet, 
Imogen,  Ophelia  (to  mention  only  the  outstand- 
ing Shakespearean  characters)  are  still  fresh 
memories.12 

11  On  one  of  her  last  American  tours  Miss  Terry  attended 
in  New  York  the  first  night  of  a  young  playwright's  new  work, 
and   at   the  end  of   the   third   act  he   was  presented  to  her. 
She  congratulated  him  warmly:   "It  is  very  good,"  she  said, 
"your  play  is  very  good  indeed,  and  I  shall  send  all  my  Amer- 
ican friends  to  see  it." 

"In  that  case,"  said  the  playwright,  with  a  very  low  and 
courtly  bow,  "my  little  piece  will  sell  ninety  million  tickets." 

12  The    dates   of   her   most   important  impersonations   since 
joining  Henry  Irving:     Ophelia  in  Hamlet,  1878;  Pauline  in 
The  Lady  of  Lyons;  Ruth  Meadows  in  The  Fate  of  Eugene 
Aram,   Queen  Henrietta   Maria  in   Charles  I,   Portia  in   The 
Merchant  of  Venice,  1879;  lolanthe  in  King  Rent's  Daughter, 
Beatrice  in  Much  Ado  about  Nothing,   1880;   Gamma  in  The 
Cup,    Letitia    Hardy    in    The    Belle's   Stratagem,    Desdemona 
in  Othello,  1881;  Juliet  in  Romeo  and  Juliet,  Beatrice  at  the 
Lyceum    (her  previous  appearance  had  been  at  Leeds),  1882; 
Viola   in    Twelfth   Night,    1884;    Olivia   in    Olivia    (revival), 
Margaret  in  Faust,  1885;  Ellaline  in  The  Amber  Heart,  1887; 
Lady   Macbeth,    in   Macbeth,    1888;    Catherine   Duval   in    The 
Dead  Heart,  1889;  Lucy  Ashton  in  Ravensicood,  1890;  Queen 
Katherine  in  Henry  VIII,  Cordelia  in  King  Lear,  1892;  Rosa- 


120      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

It  is  probably  true,  as  Mr.  Shaw  maintains,13 
that  despite  the  opportunities  given  her  to  act 
Shakespeare's  most  charming  heroines,  Miss 
Terry's  association  with  Henry  Irving  really 
resulted  in  reducing  her  total  accomplishment. 
Irving  sacrificed  her  as  he  did  himself  and 
everyone  and  everything  else,  to  his  art.  To 
be  sure  he  mounted  a  number  of  plays — notably 
Olivia,  The  Lady  of  Lyons,  Faust,  Madame 
Bans-Gene,  and  perhaps  some  of  the  Shakes- 
pearean comedies — primarily  for  her  sake. 
Yet  she  little  better  than  wasted  much  time  and 
effort  in  playing  secondary  and  unsuccessful 
parts  in  plays  selected  primarily  for  him.  And, 
sorrow  of  sorrows,  Eosalind,  whom  she  was 
born  to  play,  he  never  made  possible  for  her. 
How  incomparable  she  would  have  been! — a 
Eosalind  of  ideal  aspect,  of  delicious  high 
spirits,  of  consummate  grace  and  tenderness.14 

mund  in  BecJcet,  Nance  Oldfield  in  Nance  Oldfield,  1893; 
Queen  Guinevere  in  King  Arthur,  1895;  Imogen  in  Cymbeline, 
1896;  Madame  Sans-Ggne  in  the  play  of  that  name,  1897; 
Clarisse  in  Robespierre,  1899;  Volumnia  in  Coriolanus,  1901; 
she  acted  under  living's  management  for  the  last  time  in 
1902,  playing  Portia  at  his  final  performance  at  the  Lyceum; 
Mistress  Page  in  The  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor,  1903;  Alice- 
Sit-By-The-Fire,  1905;  Lady  Cecily  Waynflete  in  Captain 
Brassbound's  Conversion,  Hermione  in  The  Winter's  Tale,  1906. 
On  April  28,  1906,  the  fiftieth  anniversary  of  her  first  appear- 
ance, she  played  Francisca  in  Measure  for  Measure  (once 
only)  at  the  Adelphi. 

is  Mr.  Shaw's  article  on  Ellen  Terry  appeared,  in  German, 
in  the  Neue  Freie  Presse  of  Vienna.  And  there  are  several 
striking  passages  concerning  her  in  the  Dramatic  Opinions 
and  Essays. 

i*Yet,  characteristically,  she  was  better  satisfied  than  some 
of  her  admirers:  "I  have  sometimes  wondered,"  she  wrote, 


ELLEN  TERRY  121 

But  it  seems,  after  all,  rather  futile  and  un- 
grateful, in  the  face  of  what  has  really  been, 
to  cavil  about  what  might  have  been.  Ellen 
Terry  has  actually  been  one  of  those  rare 
spirits  who  confer  a  blessing  on  a  gray  world 
by  their  mere  presence.  As  a  woman  she  was 
lovable,  simple,  whole-heartedly  human,  gen- 
erous, high  spirited;  as  an  actress,  uniquely 
delightful  and  in  many  impersonations,  by  vir- 
tue of  nature  and  instinct,  of  compelling  power, 
even  genius.  Small  wonder  that  we  must  reckon 
her  as  one  of  the  great  line  of  English  women 
of  the  theatre,  the  last  indeed  of  that  small 
and  scattered  band,  who,  each  in  turn,  were 
the  queens  of  the  stage ;  small  wonder,  too,  that 
by  thousands  of  hearts  on  both  sides  of  the 
ocean  she  has  been  cherished  as  an  idealized 
fellow  creature. 

When  she  had  at  last  left  Sir  Henry  she 
bade  fair  to  enlarge  the  scope  of  her  already 
well-rounded  career  by  appearing  in  plays  of 
a  more  modern  type  than  any  that  fell  within 
the  Lyceum's  scope.  "When  her  son,  Mr. 
Gordon  Craig,  became  a  father, ' '  wrote  George 
Bernard  Shaw,  "she  said  that  no  one  would 
ever  write  plays  for  a  grandmother.  I  immedi- 
ately wrote  Captain  Brassbound's  Conversion 

"what  I  should  have  accomplished  without  Henry  Irving.  I 
might  have  had  'bigger'  parts  but  it  doesn't  follow  that  they 
would  have  been  better  ones,  and  if  they  had  been  written  by 
contemporary  dramatists  my  success  would  have  been  less 
durable.  'No  actor  or  actress  who  doesn't  play  in  the  classics — 
in  Shakespeare  or  old  comedy — will  be  heard  of  long/  was  one 
of  Henry  Irving's  statements,  and  he  was  right." 


122       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

to  prove  the  contrary.  Once  before  I  had  tried 
to  win  her  when  I  wrote  The  Man  of  Destiny 
in  which  the  heroine  is  simply  a  delineation  of 
Ellen  Terry,  imperfect,  it  is  true,  for  who  can 
describe  the  indescribable  ?"  15 

When  in  1905  Miss  Terry  played  James  M. 
Barrie's  delightful  Alice-Sit-By-The-Fire,  it 
was  felt,  by  those  minded  like  Mr.  Shaw,  and 
not  disturbed  by  seeing  her  appear  in  a  play 
widely  diverging  from  the  Lyceum  traditions, 
that  at  last  she  had  come  into  her  own — that 
she  was  doing  what  she  should  have  done  years 
before,  in  giving  her  talents  to  a  modern 
play.  And  the  next  year  she  appeared  as  Lady 
Cecily  in  the  play  that  Shaw  had  written  for  a 
grandmother,  and  that  had  waited  for  her 
seven  years,  Captain  Brassbound's  Conver- 
sion. 

She  had  been  an  actress  fifty  years.  When 
the  anniversary  approached  the  English  world 
of  the  theatre  bestirred  itself  to  mark  the  date 
fittingly.  The  celebration  took  the  form  of  an 
astonishing  entertainment  at  Drury  Lane.  The 
programme  ranged  from  songs,  recitations,  tab- 
leaux vivants,  through  Trial  by  Jury  and 
scenes  from  The  School  for  Scandal,  to  an  act 
from  Much  Ado,  in  which  Miss  Terry  herself 
was  Beatrice,  supported  by  a  cast  including  a 
score  of  the  Terry  family.  The  list  of  those 
who  appeared  on  the  stage  of  Drury  Lane  on 
the  afternoon  of  June  12,  1906,  is  simply  a  ros- 

15  Ellen  Terry  never  played  The  Man  of  Destiny.  Irving  ac- 
cepted it  and  shelved  it. 


ELLEN  TERRY  123 

ter  of  the  pick  of  the  actor's  profession  in  Eng- 
land; distinguished  actors,  if  nothing  more 
could  be  found  for  them  to  do,  thought  them- 
selves honored  to  walk  on  as  supernumeraries ; 
Genee  danced;  Caruso  sang;  Signora  Duse 
came  all  the  way  from  Florence  to  pay  homage ; 
the  audience,  which  had  begun  to  gather  for 
the  great  occasion  as  early  as  the  previous 
day,16  was  overwhelming  in  its  enthusiasm,  and 
altogether  the  occasion  was  an  unprecedented 
demonstration  of  loyalty  and  affection. 

Early  in  the  following  year  (1907)  Miss 
Terry  made  her  eighth  and  as  an  actress  her 
last  tour  of  the  United  States.17  Three  years 
later,  and  again  in  1914,  she  came  as  a  lec- 
turer reading  scenes  from  Shakespeare  and 
commenting  on  his  heroines.  It  was  good  to 
see  and  hear  her  again  if  only  on  the  plat- 
form, even  though,  as  William  Winter  said, 
it  is  one  thing  to  act,  another  to  expound. 

16  The  first  to  appear  was  an  elderly  woman  who  long  before 
noon  on  Monday  placed  herself  and  her  campstool  outside  the 
entrance  to  the  theatre.     The  performance  was  not  scheduled 
to  begin  until  the  next  day  at  half  past  one.     During  Monday 
afternoon  and  evening  the  gathering  outside  the  doors  steadily 
increased   in  size,  until,  at  midnight  there  were  many  hun- 
dreds.    Miss  Terry,  late  Monday  night,  appeared  to  greet  the 
waiting  enthusiasts,  and  Mr.  Arthur  Collins,  the  manager  of 
Drury  Lane,  furnished  them  a  supper  of  hot  coffee,  rolls  and 
cake.     When  the  doors  were  at  last  opened  many  of  those  who 
had   thus    patiently    waited   failed   to    find    room   within    the 
theatre.     The   proceeds   of  this   entertainment,   together   with 
those  of  a  popular  subscription  in  England  and  America,  went 
to  Miss  Terry  and  amounted  to  about  forty  thousand  dollars. 

17  It  was  during  this  tour  that  Miss  Terry  made  her  third 
marriage,  to  James  Carew,  an  actor  of  her  companj.     Charlea 
Wardell  (Charles  Kelly)   died  in  1885. 


124      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

"To  see  her  as  an  actress  was  to  see  a  vital 
creature  of  beauty,  passion,  tenderness,  and 
eloquence,  a  being,  in  Cleopatra's  fine  phrase, 
all  'fire  and  air.'  "  On  the  lecture  platform 
she  was  not  quite  all  that,  but  she  was  still 
Ellen  Terry,  imperial  of  figure,  rich  of  voice, 
buoyant  of  mood.18  As  such  her  public  in 
England  and  America  saw  its  last  of  her.19 

is  During  this  tour  the  honor  and  affection  she  had  won  in 
the  minds  of  Americans  were  attested  by  various  testimonials. 
She  was  given  at  a  special  ceremony  the  Founder's  Medal  of 
the  now  extinct  New  Theatre  in  New  York,  a  "farewell  ban- 
quet" was  tendered  her  there,  and  in  both  New  York  and  Bos- 
ton she  received  an  elaborate  "book  of  welcome,"  signed  by 
many  notable  people  and  accompanied  by  poetic  addresses, 
composed  in  one  case  by  Percy  MacKaye  and  in  the  other  by 
Josephine  Preston  Peabody. 

i»  In  January,  1914,  she  appeared  at  King's  Hall,  London, 
as  the  Abbess  in  two  performances  of  Paphnutius,  a  play 
written  in  the  tenth  century  by  Hroswitha,  a  Benedictine 
nun.  It  was  on  this  old  play  that  Anatole  France  founded 
his  romance  Thais.  Thus  did  Ellen  Terry,  at  nearly  three 
score  and  ten,  continue  to  furnish  proof  of  her  still  youthful 
spirit  and  readiness  for  work.  Later  in  the  year  she  went  to 
Australia  to  give  there  her  Shakspearean  lecture-readings. 
The  great  European  war  broke  out,  and  conditions  in  Aus- 
tralia became  so  unfavorable  that  Miss  Terry  sailed  for  the 
United  States,  where  she  again  lectured  in  a  few  of  the  larger 
cities. 

For  some  years  she  had  had  increasing  trouble  with  her 
eyes.  Frequently  she  would  spend  the  periods  between  the 
scenes  in  a  darkened  room.  On  February  23,  1914,  in  New 
York,  Miss  Terry  underwent  an  operation,  which  proved  suc- 
cessful, for  the  removal  of  a  cataract  from  her  right  eye.  In 
June,  1915,  she  reappeared  in  London  on  the  occasion  of  a 
matinee  given  at  the  Haymarket  in  aid  of  one  of  the  war 
charities.  The  play — a  ballet  pantomime  called  The  Princess 
and  the  Pea — was  the  first  musical  piece  in  which  Miss  Terry 
ever  took  part.  On  this  occasion  also  her  two  grandchildren 
made  their  stage  debut. 


ELLEN  TERRY  125 

She  is  now  living  quietly  in  one  of  those  small 
country  houses  the  "  collection "  of  which  has 
been  one  of  her  hobbies.  She  has  given  in  gen- 
erous measure  pleasure  to  many,  many  thou- 
sands ; — more  than  pleasure,  inspiration  indeed, 
to  countless  men  and  women.  The  realization 
of  this  must  be  a  great  reward,  to  make  happy 
the  twilight  of  her  life. 


GABRIELLE  R&JANE 

A  CERTAIN  Frenchman  once  voiced  the  feel- 
ing of  his  fellow  Parisians  concerning  Re- 
jane by  calling  upon  all  good  French  provin- 
cials, who  would  learn  the  language  of  the 
Boulevards  in  a  single  lesson,  and  all  children 
of  other  lands  curious  as  to  the  pleasures,  tastes, 
and  manners  of  Paris,  to  harken  wnile  he  gave 
them  this  advice :  "Go  .and  see  Rejane.  Don't 
go  to  the  Opera,  where  the  music  is  German; 
nor  to  the  Opera-Comique,  where  it  is  Italian; 
nor  yet  to  the  Comedie-Frcwgaise,  where  the 
sublime  is  made  ridiculous,  and  the  heroes  and 
heroines  of  Racine  take  on  the  attitudes  of  hull- 
fighters  and  cigarette-makers ;  nor  to  the  Odeon, 
nor  to  the  Palais-Royal,  nor  here,  nor  there,  nor 
elsewhere :  go  and  see  Rejane.  Be  she  at  Lon- 
don, Chicago,  Brussels,  St.  Petersburg — Re- 
jane is  Paris.  She  carries  the  soul  of  Paris 
with  her,  wheresoever  she  listeth." 

Madame  Rejane — the  Parisienne :  they  are  in- 
terchangeable terms.  And  what  is  a  Pari- 
sienne! Let  our  sprightly  French  friend — M. 
Dauphin  Meunier — tell  us ;  he  does  it  well : 1 

"A  fabulous  being,  in  an  everyday  human 
form ;  a  face,  not  beautiful,  scarcely  even  pretty, 

Hn  "The  Yellow  Book,"  Vol.  II  (1894). 
126 


GABRIELLE   REJANE 


GABRIELLE  R^JANE  127 

which  looks  upon  the  world  with  an  air  at  once 
ironical  and  sympathetic;  a  brow  that  grows 
broader  or  narrower  according  to  the  capricious 
invasions  of  her  aureole  of  hair;  an  odd  little 
nose,  perked  heavenward;  two  roguish  eyes, 
now  blue,  now  black ;  the  rude  accents  of  a  street- 
girl,  suddenly  changing  to  the  well-bred  mur- 
muring of  a  great  lady;  abrupt,  abundant  ges- 
tures, eloquently  finishing  half -spoken  sen- 
tences ;  a  supple  neck — a  slender,  opulent  figure 
—a  dainty  foot,  that  scarcely  touches  the  earth 
and  yet  can  fly  amazingly  near  the  ceiling ;  lips, 
nervous,  sensuous,  trembling,  curling;  a  frock, 
simple  or  sumptuous,  bought  at  a  bargain  or 
created  by  a  Court-dressmaker;  a  gay,  a  grave 
demeanor;  grace,  wit,  sweetness,  tartness; 
frivolity  and  earnestness,  tenderness  and  indif- 
ference: such  is  Woman  at  Paris:  such  is  the 
Parisienne. 

"No  need  for  her  to  learn  good  manners,  nor 
bad  ones:  she's  born  with  both.  According  to 
the  time  or  place,  she  will  talk  to  you  of  politics, 
of  art,  of  literature — of  dress,  trade,  cookery — 
of  finance,  of  socialism,  of  luxury,  of  starvation 
—with  the  patness,  the  sure  touch,  the  absolute 
sincerity,  of  one  who  has  seen  all,  experienced 
all,  understood  all.  She  is  as  sentimental  as  a 
song,  wily  as  a  diplomat,  gay  as  folly,  or  serious 
as  a  novel  by  Zola.  What  has  she  read? 
Where  was  she  educated?  Who  cares?  Her 
book  of  life  is  Paris;  she  knows  her  Paris  by 
heart;  and  whoso  knows  Paris  can  dispense 
with  further  knowledge. ' ' 


128      HEROINES  OP  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Be  jane  was  from  the  beginning  a  veritable 
child  of  Paris.  She  was  born  on  June  6,  1857, 
at  14  Rue  de  la  Duane,  in  a  business  section  of 
the  city.  This  street  had  been ' l  one  of  the  storm 
centers  for  almost  every  great  riot  known  to  the 
Paris  of  the  last  century  and  a  half. ' '  The  little 
Gabrielle  Charlotte  Eeju  passed  her  infancy  in 
that  busy  part  of  Paris  between  Porte  Saint- 
Martin  and  Place  Chateau  d'Eau. 

Her  parents  were  poor.  Her  father  had 
earlier  been  an  actor  and  at  one  time  had  di- 
rected a  theatre  at  Arras.2  When  Gabrielle  was 
born,  and  during  the  years  of  her  infancy,  he 
was  the  ticket-taker  and  the  keeper  of  the  buffet 
at  the  Ambigu.  In  the  work  of  dispensing  re- 
freshments Madame  Eeju,  who  came  of  a  good 
Valenciennes  family,  actively  assisted,  and  even 
Gabrielle  herself,  when  she  grew  old  enough,  was 
pressed  into  service.3 

With  the  home  life  virtually  transferred  to  the 
lobbies  of  the  Ambigu,  it  was  inevitable  that 
Gabrielle,  breathing  the  mystery-filled  atmos- 
phere of  a  theatre,  should  at  once  feel  its  strong 
influence.  Like  Ellen  Terry  and  Mrs.  Fiske, 
and  unlike  her  compatriot  the  great  Sarah,  Ee- 
jane  was,  from  the  beginning,  of  the  theatre. 
She  was  an  amiably  mischievous  child,  possessed 
of  an  immense  curiosity  about  life  behind  the 

2  Further  precedent  for  Gabrielle's  career  was  furnished  by 
her  aunt,  Mme.  Naptal-Arnault,  at  one  time  a  pensionnaire 
of  the  Comtdie-Frangaise. 

s  For  much  of  the  information  in  the  early  part  of  this 
chapter  the  author  is  indebted  to  Loges  et  Coulisses,  by 
Jules  Huret. 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  129 

scenes.  She  remembers  vividly  those  early 
days,  in  which  she  divided  her  time  between  her 
small  duties,  napping  in  corners,  and  revelling 
in  the  delights  that  presented  themselves  over 
the  footlights.  There  she  saw  many  of  the  stars 
of  the  day,  Jane  Essler,  Frederick  Lemaitre, 
Marie  Laurent,  Adele  Page.  On  the  night  of  a 
new  production,  between  the  acts,  she  would  go 
to  her  mother  and  recount  the  story  of  the  play 
and  give  childish  imitations  of  the  various  play- 
ers. To  imitate  the  fine  gowns  she  saw  on  the 
stage,  she  would  make  a  train  from  the  buffet 
napkins.  One  of  the  memories  of  her  childhood 
is  the  enchantment  that  possessed  her  when  she 
saw  herself,  dressed  in  a  velvet  robe  and  a  royal 
diadem,  reflected  in  Adele  Page's  splendid 
cheval  glass. 

When  Gabrielle  was  about  five,  her  father 
died,  and  mother  and  daughter  were  thrown  on 
their  own  resources.  Mme.  Eeju  secured  a  posi- 
tion at  one  of  the  other  theatres,  and  Gabrielle 
went  to  school.  She  was  to  some  extent  in  the 
care  of  a  friend,  but  she  was  privileged  with  ex- 
traordinary liberties.  Her  mother  gave  her  a 
franc  each  morning  with  which  to  buy  her  even- 
ning  meal,  and  it  was  with  immense  pride  that 
she  would  go  forth  alone  to  take  her  dinner  at  a 
restaurant.  Often  she  would  save  enough  from 
her  franc  to  buy  an  orange  which  she  would  take 
with  her  into  the  balcony  of  the  Ambigu,  where 
she  was  still  privileged  to  go.  There  she  would 
tarry  to  see  an  act  of  the  play  before  she  went 
home. 


130      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

It  is  clear  that  she  was  a  precocious,  clever 
child.  She  was  already,  indeed,  an  actress. 
Her  evening  walk  would  invariably  take  her  past 
her  beloved  Ambigu.  She  made  an  event  of  this 
passage,  putting  on  her  best  attitudes  and  smiles 
for  the  artists  who  might  be  seated  in  the  terrace 
of  the  cafe. 

This  cafe  of  the  Ambigu  was  the  scene  of  one 
of  the  oft-repeated  episodes  of  Ke  jane's  child- 
hood. The  proprietor,  a  relative  of  some  sort, 
was  in  the  habit  of  beating  his  wife.  One  even- 
ing, Gabrielle,  who  knew  what  to  expect,  hap- 
pened— as  was  not  unusual — to  be  in  the  cafe. 
Soon  the  poor  woman's  cries  were  heard  as  her 
lord  and  master  belabored  her.  A  patron  de- 
manded of  Gabrielle  what  the  terrible  noises 
meant.  "Oh,  that,  Monsieur,"  she  said. 
"Why,  they're  rehearsing  upstairs." 

Soon  the  mother  changed  her  work,  and  took 
up  the  painting  of  fans.  Between  sessions  of 
the  school,  and  all  day  on  Thursdays,  little  Ga- 
brielle helped  in  this  work  and  proved  herself 
adept.  They  received  for  this  work  about  fifty 
cents  per  dozen  fans.  Madame  Beju  seems  to 
have  been  sensitive  as  to  her  new  work.  She  and 
her  young  daughter,  too  proud  to  have  it  known 
that  they  were  doing  work  of  that  sort,  or  per- 
haps for  fear  of  offending  certain  rich  relatives, 
took  a  neighbor  into  their  confidence  and  paid 
her  for  delivering  the  fans  to  la  maison  Meyer. 

If  mother  and  daughter  had  continued  to  live 
in  the  immediate  neighborhood  of  the  Ambigu 
it  is  not  unlikely  that  the  already  lively  ambition 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  131 

of  the  girl  would  have  found  its  outlet  at  that 
theatre.  We  have  seen  something  of  her  en- 
thusiasm for  the  Ambigu  and  her  close  relation- 
ship with  its  entourage.  Once  launched  upon 
her  career  there  as  an  actress  of  popular  drama, 
she  would  very  likely  have  remained  there  and 
missed  the  valuable  training  that  she  was  to 
receive  at  the  Conservatoire.  As  it  happened, 
however,  when  she  was  about  ten  her  mother 
moved  from  Rue  de  Lancry  to  17  Rue  Notre- 
Dame-de-Lorette,  and  in  large  measure  the  in- 
fluence of  the  Ambigu  was  removed. 

On  the  same  floor  with  Madame  Eeju  and  her 
daughter  in  their  new  quarters  lived  a  lady  with 
whom  they  gradually  formed  a  close  friendship. 
When  the  war  of  1870  broke  out,  the  new  friend 
left  Paris,  leaving  her  apartment  in  charge  of 
Mme.  Eeju  and  Gabrielle.  There  the  windows, 
unlike  those  of  Mme.  Keju's  own  suite,  over- 
looked the  street.  When  the  Commune  brought 
the  terrors  of  civil  war  to  Paris,  it  was  from 
these  windows  that  the  child  witnessed  what 
was  to  her  a  terrible  and  long-remembered 
sight,  a  street  battle  between  the  government 
troops  and  the  Communists.  The  bodies  of 
slain  men,  carried  past  under  those  windows, 
gave  her  her  first  glimpse  of  death. 

The  war  past,  Gabrielle,  now  fourteen,  re- 
turned to  school  at  the  Pension  Boulet,  Rue 
Pigalle.  She  applied  herself  diligently  to  her 
somewhat  neglected  studies,  and  to  such  good 
purpose  that  the  mistress  of  the  school,  with 
whom  Gabrielle  had  become  a  favorite,  offered 


132      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

her  a  position  as  an  assistant  with  the  younger 
pupils.  She  was  to  be  paid  forty  francs  a 
month,  and  her  luncheon.  To  her  mother  this 
seemed  to  be  the  opening  of  an  honorable  career. 
Not  so  Gabrielle  herself,  who  cherished  con- 
stantly her  already  fixed  ambition  to  be  an 
actress.  She  was,  however,  fond  of  children, 
and  to  tide  affairs  over  she  took  a  class  of  the 
younger  pupils.  She  got  along  well  enough 
with  them  with  their  ordinary  lessons,  but  her 
own  instruction  in  sewing  and  embroidery  had 
been  neglected,  and  she  had  to  have  the  help  of 
the  older  of  her  pupils,  to  bridge  the  gap. 

Occasionally,  of  a  Sunday  evening,  Gabrielle 
was  taken  by  her  mother  to  the  house  of  a  friend 
who  gathered  about  herself  a  modest  salon. 
There  came  such  men  as  Felicien  David,  the 
composer,  Joseph  Kelm,  the  writer,  and  the 
architect,  Frantz  Jourdain.  Gabrielle,  young 
as  she  was,  with  her  natural  gayety  and  spon- 
taneity at  once  took  her  place  in  the  circle.  She 
would  sing  for  the  assembly  the  popular  songs 
of  the  day — compositions  often  full  of  doubtful 
meanings  that  she  very  imperfectly  understood. 
Her  little  successes  naturally  strengthened  her 
longing  to  be  an  actress,  to  stir  great  houses  as 
she  amused  this  little  circle  of  friends. 

To  Gabrielle's  increasing  ambition  her  mother 
set  herself  in  opposition.  To  her  mind  the  forty 
francs  per  month  was  not  lightly  to  be  sacrificed. 
And  she  said  she  did  not  care  to  be  the  mother 
of  an  actress.  She  lived  to  own  herself  in  the 
wrong. 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  133 

One  evening,  as  mother  and  daughter  were 
passing  the  Theatre  Frangais,  they  saw  a  crowd 
at  the  stage  door.  They  questioned  a  bystander 
and  were  told  that  this  had  been  the  farewell 
performance  of  Regnier.  Gabrielle  insisted  on 
waiting  to  see  him  come  out.  She  had  never 
seen  him,  but  every  one  knew  of  Eegnier,  great 
artist  and  lovable  personality.  Soon  he  ap- 
peared, a  little,  old  man,  who  got  up  into  his 
carriage  and  acknowledged  the  ovation  with  a 
modest  and  confused  air.  Gabrielle  never  for- 
got her  first  and  touching  glimpse  of  the  man  to 
whom  she  was  soon  to  owe  so  much. 

The  struggle  with  her  mother  over  her  cher- 
ished plan  to  go  on  the  stage  went  on  for  an- 
other year.  A  Mile.  Angelo,  a  friend  of  Mme. 
Reju,  attempted  to  make  peace  by  offering 
Gabrielle  a  dot  of  10,000  francs  if  she  would 
accept  a  plan  to  marry  as  a  solution  of  the  diffi- 
culty. But  Gabrielle  refused  to  be  bought  off, 
and  steadfastly  clung  to  her  ambition,  with  the 
result  that  the  mother  at  last  gave  in. 

The  friend  from  whose  windows  Gabrielle  had 
seen  the  battling  Communists  had  returned  to 
Paris  and  now  took  up  the  girl's  cause.  She  in- 
troduced Gabrielle  to  Charles  Simon,4  who  knew 
well  the  actor  Eegnier,  now  an  honored  teacher 
at  the  Conservatoire.  The  girl  was  duly  intro- 
duced to  Regnier,  who  received  her  affably  but 
tried  to  dissuade  her  from  attempting  the  career 
of  an  actress.  He  was  unable  to  overcome  the 

*Who,  twenty-eight  years  later,  with  Pierre  Berton,  was 
to  write  for  her  Zaza,  one  of  her  most  successful  plays. 


134      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

ardent  resolution  of  Gabrielle,  and  finally  con- 
sented to  receive  her,  for  two  months,  on  the  con- 
dition that  if  at  the  end  of  the  time  she  failed 
to  convince  him  of  her  calling  she  would  prom- 
ise to  give  up  the  attempt  for  good  and  all. 
Sure  of  success,  she  promised. 

Begnier's  first  task  was  to  cure  his  pupil  of 
a  thickness  of  diction.  For  hours  every  day  she 
practiced  enunciation,  but  found  her  master 
hard  to  please.  Nevertheless  he  must  have  seen 
promise  in  her,  for  during  the  summer  (of 
1872)  he  wrote  to  Charles  Simon  that  when 
classes  assembled  he  would  receive  Gabrielle  as 
a  regularly  enrolled  pupil.  When  the  Conser- 
vatoire reopened,  she  passed  her  entrance  exam- 
ination by  reading  the  role  of  Henriette  in  Les 
Femmes  Savantes,  and  was  admitted.  Here 
began,  when  she  was  fifteen,  the  serious  work 
of  her  career. 

She  was  an  ardent  pupil.  Not  content  with 
the  regular  course,  she  and  her  mother  squeezed 
their  narrow  means  that  the  girl  might  amplify 
her  studies  with  a  number  of  private  lessons 
with  Eegnier  at  his  house.  He  gave  her  the 
lessons,  but  when  she  offered  to  pay,  he  refused 
to  accept.  "One  does  not  accept  pay,"  he  said, 
"when  he  is  privileged  to  deal  with  the  tempera- 
ment of  an  artist. ' '  And,  thus,  the  trial  months 
past,  Eegnier,  instead  of  sending  Gabrielle 
packing,  engaged  himself  to  teach  her  as  best 
he  could,  gratis,  till  her  period  as  a  student 
should  end. 

In  January  (1873),  came  the  annual  elimina- 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  135 

tion  examination.  Gabrielle,  like  the  rest,  sub- 
mitted to  the  test  that  weeded  out  the  less  prom- 
ising pupils.  She  had  a  role — that  of  Agnes— 
not  altogether  suited  to  her,  her  dress  was  not 
too  well  chosen,  she  was  at  the  most  awkward 
of  ages,  and  she  was  by  no  means  the  prettiest 
girl  of  the  lot.  Gazing  at  her,  Edward  Thierry, 
director  of  the  Comedie  Franc,  aise,  said  in  a 
doubtful  tone  to  Eegnier,  "Do  we  keep  this?" 
"Yes,"  promptly  replied  Regnier,  "she  is  in  my 
class  and  she  stays."  At  the  end  of  the  school 
year  came  the  annual  competition.  For  her  part 
in  the  preliminary  examination  Eegnier  chose 
L' Intrigue  Epistolaire.  Thierry,  again  one  of 
the  judges,  failed  to  recognize  her  and  said, 
"This  child  is  charming!  She  is  the  hope  of 
the  competition."  And,  imitating  his  col- 
league's former  doubting  tone,  Eegnier  now 
said,  "We  keep  this,  then?" 

In  the  competition  itself  Gabrielle,  in  this 
same  scene  of  L' Intrigue  Epistolaire,  fell  just 
short  of  a  prize  and  received  a  premier  ac- 
cessit,  or  honorable  mention, — not  bad  for  a 
girl  just  turned  sixteen  and  a  mere  beginner.5 

In  this  competition  Mile.  Legault  won  the 
first  prize  in  comedy  and  with  it  a  post  at  the 
Comedie  Frangaise.  Her  departure  left  vacant 

»Mme.  Re"jane  recalls  that  her  costume  on  this  occasion 
was  the  object  of  much  solicitude  on  the  part  of  Regnier. 
On  the  day  of  the  contest  he  came  to  her  house  at  nine  in 
the  morning  to  pass  judgment  on  her  dress,  which  was  made 
of  white  tarlatan  at  nine  sows  per  metre,  and  cost  in  all 
about  ten  francs.  Mme.  Regnier  loaned  gloves  for  the  oc- 
casion. 


136      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

a  scholarship  of  1,200  francs.  In  the  same 
competition  her  successor  to  the  scholarship 
was  to  be  determined.  Kegnier  had  resolved 
to  get  the  scholarship,  if  possible,  for  Ga- 
brielle.  The  professors  who  sat  in  judgment 
were  forbidden  by  a  rule  of  the  Conservatoire 
to  impart  personally  any  news  of  the  outcome. 
Such  information  was  to  come  only  from  the 
administration.  Eegnier,  however,  conspired 
with  his  favorite  pupil  to  relieve  her  of  sus- 
pense. If  she  were  the  successful  candidate 
for  the  scholarship  he  was  to  rub  his  nose  as 
he  left  the  building.  After  the  meeting,  there- 
fore, she  stood  anxiously  in  the  porte-cochere, 
awaiting  her  teacher  and  the  behavior  of  his 
index  finger.  Imagine  the  importance  of  the 
moment  to  the  rather  shabbily  dressed,  not  too 
well-fed,  nervously  anxious  girl.  To  stay  her 
hunger  as  she  waited  she  was  eating  bits  from 
a  long  loaf  tucked  under  her  arm.  First  came 
M.  Legouve,  who,  by  a  curious  chance,  rubbed 
his  nose  briskly  as  he  left  the  building.  Then 
came  MM.  Beauplan  and  Ambroise  Thomas,  and 
each,  oddly  enough,  suddenly  gave  his  nose  a 
vigorous  rub.  Gabrielle  wondered,  but  could 
not  believe  that  all  these  demonstrations  were 
for  her.  Finally,  out  came  Begnier,  smiling, 
and  slowly  rubbing  his  nose  with  the  end  of  his 
forefinger.  For  the  moment  the  loaf  of  bread 
had  been  forgotten.  Now  she  waved  it  aloft, 
ddncing  about  in  an  ecstasy  of  joy. 

The  winning  of  the  scholarship  made  it  pos- 
sible for  Gabrielle  to  go  on  with  her  studies  in 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  137 

the  two  months'  interval  that  preceded  the  re- 
opening of  the  Conservatoire. 

Francisque  Sarcey  was  discerning  enough  to 
note  the  promise  in  this  sixteen  year  old  girl. 
He  said  of  her,  in  speaking  to  the  playwright 
Meilhac:  "She  has  a  face  you  would  know  as 
Parisian  a  mile  off  .  .  .  and  she  is  full  of  the 
devil.  If  this  girl  doesn't  make  her  way,  I  shall 
be  much  surprised.  .  .  .  She  is  charming ;  she  is 
piquant;  and  if  I  were  a  manager  I  would  en- 
gage her  out  of  hand." 

To  eke  out  the  family  income,  Gabrielle  had 
two  pupils,  youngster  though  she  was.  They 
were  young  girls  from  Gascony,  and  it  was  her 
task  to  cure  them  of  their  un-Parisian  accent. 
She  remembers  that  one  day  when  she  was  on 
her  way  to  her  pupils,  the  omnibus  passed  a 
church.  The  crowd  about  the  door,  and  the 
numerous  flowers,  denoted  a  funeral.  "They 
are  burying  Desclee," 6  said  a  fellow  passenger. 
Gabrielle  had  seen  Desclee  in  some  of  her  no- 
table successes: — Froufrou,  La  Femme  de 
Claude,  La  Princesse  Georges — and  had  been 
stirred  to  renewed  ambition  by  her  art.  So  now 
she  was  tempted  to  alight  and  pay  her  re- 
spects to  the  dead  actress'  memory;  but  she 
remembered  her  lesson,  and  went  on  to  her  pu- 
pils. 

Her  last  year  (1873-4)  at  the  Conservatoire 
Mme.  Eejane  remembers  not  only  for  its  months 

6Aim6e  Olympe  Desclee  (1836-1874),  of  the  Gymnase,  who 
excelled  in  modern  French  emotional  plays.  She  acted  with 
success  in  London,  and  also  appeared  in  Belgium  and  Russia. 


138      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

of  hard  study  but  for  an  incident  or  two  that, 
trivial  in  themselves,  had  considerable  impor- 
tance in  her  youthfully  ambitious  mind.  One 
morning  Kegnier  called  on  her  to  recite  "La 
Fille  d'Honneur,"  a  poem  she  had  memorized 
by  hearing  it  often  spoken  by  a  fellow  pupil. 
She  was  horribly  nervous.  Her  own  two  pupils 
were  present,  as  auditrices,  and  Gabrielle  feared 
the  usual  frequent  interruption  of  Eegnier,  who 
as  a  rule  made  his  pupils  repeatedly  go  back 
over  imperfectly  recited  passages.  This  time, 
however,  he  allowed  her  to  proceed  to  the  end, 
which  agitated  her  still  more,  and  then  he  said 
in  a  solemn  tone  as  if  pronouncing  a  final  judg- 
ment on  her:  "C'est  tres  bien,  ma  petite; 
descends,  tu  seras  une  grande  artiste."  Eejane 
says  that  the  intense  joy  of  that  instant  never 
was  equaled  afterwards,  even  in  the  moments 
of  her  greatest  triumphs. 

The  pupils  of  the  Conservatoire  were  per- 
mitted to  accept  engagements  to  play  on  Sun- 
days at  the  little  theatre  of  the  Tour-d'Au- 
vergne.  There  it  was  that  Gabrielle  made  her 
first  public  appearance.  The  play  was  Les 
Deux  Timides,  and  in  acting  it  she  had  the  inex- 
pert assistance  of  Albert  Carre.  In  the  middle 
of  the  piece  M.  Carre  was  seated  at  a  desk,  writ- 
ing a  letter,  when  his  nose  began  to  bleed.  He 
bolted  from  the  stage,  leaving  the  debutante 
alone  to  face  her  first  audience  in  the  midst  of 
a  staggering  contretemps.  Advice  was  hoarsely 
whispered  from  the  wings  to  do  this  or  that,  to 
walk  off,  to  sit  down,  to  wait  for  Carre;  Ga- 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  139 

brielle  coolly  seated  herself  and  took  up  the 
writing  of  the  letter  until,  a  moment  later,  the 
bleeding  stopped,  Carre  returned.7 

When  the  concours  of  1874  arrived — the  an- 
nual prize  contest  of  the  Conservatoire — Ga- 
brielle  's  progress  had  been  such  that  her  fellow- 
students  and  her  professor  all  thought  her  sure 
of  the  first  prize  in  comedy.  Eegnier  chose  for 
her  one  of  Boxelane's  scenes  in  Les  Trois  Sul- 
tanes.  When  she  had  finished  she  felt  that  she 
had  done  herself  scant  justice.  Then  the  un- 
expected happened.  She  was  also  to  appear  in 
a  dialogue  called  La  Jeunesse,  by  Emile  Augier. 
A  youthful  couple  met  at  a  fountain.  The 
young  man  says : ' '  Cyprienne ! ' '  She  exclaims : 
"Ah!  Mon  Dieu!"  Gabrielle  delivered  this 
commonplace  speech  with  such  a  sincerity  and 
intensity  of  emotion  that  the  audience  broke 
into  applause.  Reassured,  she  played  the  dia- 
logue through  to  the  end  with  a  command  of 
emotional  acting  that  surprised  even  her 
friends,  for  she  had  been  thought  of  as  only  a 
comedienne,  a  soubrette. 

When  the  prizes  were  announced,  Gabrielle 
found  that  she  had  not  only  missed  getting  the 
first  comedy  prize,  but  that  she  was  to  get  only 
a  share  of  the  second ;  the  other  half  was  to  go 

7  The  students  played  also  in  the  suburbs,  at  Versailles, 
Mantes,  and  Chartres.  It  was  at  Chartres,  where  she  had 
a  part  in  Les  Paysans  Lorrains,  that  the  playbills  first  named 
her  Rgjane.  Till  now  she  had  gone  by  her  own  name  of 
Re"ju.  She  played  also,  while  still  a  student,  at  matinees- 
confe'rences  at  the  Porte-Saint-Martin,  in  Le  Depit  Amoureux 
and  Les  M6nechmes. 


140      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

to  Mile.  Jeanne  Samary,  she  "of  the  perfect 
laugh. " 

Eegnier  was  chagrined.  "  Mai  fait  ears,"  he 
called  the  judges.  And  some  of  the  newspaper 
comment  showed  a  recognition  of  unusual  merit 
in  the  young  Rejane.  Sareey,  the  reigning  king 
of  the  Paris  critics,  had  again  been  present,  and 
Le  Temps  rang  with  his  praises  of  her.  And 
his  praises  were  perhaps  better  than  official 
prizes.  A  score  of  years  later,  M.  Meunier 
wrote : 

"To-day,  as  then,  though  twenty  years  have 
passed,  there  is  no  possibility  of  success,  no 
chance  of  getting  an  engagement,  for  a  pupil  on 
leaving  the  Conservatoire,  unless  a  certain  all- 
powerful  critic,  supreme  judge,  arbiter  beyond 
appeal,  sees  fit  to  pronounce  a  decision  confirm- 
ing the  verdict  of  the  Examining  Jury.  .  .  .  He 
smiles  or  frowns,  the  Jury  bows  its  head.  The 
pupils  tremble  before  this  monstrous  Fetich — 
for  the  Public  thinks  with  him,  and  sees  only 
through  his  spectacles;  and  no  star  can  shine 
till  his  short  sight  has  discovered  it.  This  puis- 
sant astronomer  is  Monsieur  Francisque  Sar- 
cey. .  .  . 

'  '  Monsieur  Sarcey  smiled  upon  and  applauded 
Rejane 's  debut  at  the  Conservatoire.  He  con- 
secrated to  her  as  many  as  fifty  lines  of  intelli- 
gent criticism ;  and  I  pray  to  Heaven  they  may 
be  remembered  to  his  credit  on  the  Day  of  Judg- 
ment. Here  they  are,  in  that  two-penny,  half- 
penny style  of  his,  so  dear  to  the  readers  of 
Le  Temps: 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  141 

"  'I  own  that,  for  my  part,  I  should  have 
willingly  awarded  to  the  latter  (Mile.  Eejane) 
a  first  prize.  It  seems  to  me  that  she  deserved 
it.  But  the  Jury  is  frequently  influenced  by 
extrinsic  and  private  motives,  into  which  it  is 
not  permitted  to  pry.  A  first  prize  carries -with 
it  the  right  of  entrance  into  the  Comedie  Fran- 
gaise;  and  the  Jury  did  not  think  Mademoiselle 
Bejane,  with  her  little  wide-awake  face,  suited 
to  the  vast  frame  of  the  House  of  Moliere. 
That  is  well  enough ;  but  the  second  prize  which 
it  awarded  her  authorized  the  director  of  the 
Odeon  to  receive  her  into  his  company ;  and  that 
perspective  alone  ought  to  have  sufficed  to  dis- 
suade the  Jury  from  the  course  it  took.  .  .  . 
Every  one  knows  that  at  present  the  Odeon  is, 
for  a  beginner,  a  most  indifferent  school.  .  .  . 
Instead  of  shoving  its  promising  pupils  into  it 
by  the  shoulders,  the  Conservatoire  should  for- 
bid them  to  approach  it,  lest  they  should  be  lost 
there.  What  will  Mademoiselle  Eejane  do  at 
the  Odeon?  Show  her  legs  in  La  Jeunnesse  de 
Louis  XIV,  which  is  to  be  revived  at  the  open- 
ing of  the  season?  A  pretty  state  of  things. 
She  must  either  go  to  the  Vaudeville  or  to  the 
Gymnase.  It  is  there  that  she  will  form  her- 
self; it  is  there  that  she  will  learn  her  trade, 
show  what  she  is  capable  of,  and  prepare  her- 
self for  the  Comedie  Frangaise,  if  she  is  ever  to 
enter  it.  ...  She  recited  a  fragment  from  Les 
Trois  Sultanes.  ...  I  was  delighted  by  her 
choice.  Les  Trois  Sultanes  is  so  little  known 
nowadays.  .  .  .  What  wit  there  is  in  her  look, 


142      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

her  smile!  With  her  small  eyes,  shrewd  and 
piercing,  with  her  little  face  thrust  forward,  she 
has  so  knowing  an  air,  one  is  inclined  to  smile 
at  the  mere  sight  of  her.  Does  she  perhaps 
show  a  little  too  much  assurance  ?  What  of  it  ? 
'Tis  the  result  of  excessive  timidity.  But  she 
laughs  with  such  good  grace,  she  has  so  fresh 
and  true  a  voice,  she  articulates  so  clearly,  she 
seems  so  happy  to  be  alone  and  to  have  talent, 
that  involuntarily  one  thinks  of  Chenier's  line: 
"Sa  bienvenue  au  jour  lui  rit  dans  tons  les 
yeux."  ...  I  shall  be  surprised  if  she  does  not 
make  her  way. '  ' ' 

Second  prize  or  first,  it  mattered  not,  really ; 
for  she  had,  almost  at  once,  offers  from  three 
theatres:  the  Odeon,  the  government  theatre 
that  by  the  conditions  of  the  award  had  a  right 
to  her  services,  and  also  from  the  Vaudeville 
and  the  Gymnase.  M.  Duquesnel  of  the  Odeon 
proposed,  as  Sarcey  had  predicted,  that  she  take 
a  part  in  the  impending  La  Jeunesse  de  Louis 
XIV.  Kejane,  however,  declined  to  cut  short 
her  studies  at  the  Conservatoire,  which  had  yet 
a  few  weeks  to  run. 

Her  choice  fell  to  the  Vaudeville,  as  the 
theatre  best  suiting  her  methods  and  sym- 
pathies. Also,  the  pay  there  was  to  be  four 
thousand  francs  per  year,  and  costumes,  as 
against  one  hundred  and  fifty  francs  per  month 
at  the  Odeon.  With  the  directors  of  the  Vaude- 
ville she  signed  a  provisional  contract,  by  the 
terms  of  which  she  was  to  join  their  forces  if  the 
Odeon  did  not  press  home  its  claim  to  her. 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  143 

Weeks  passed,  the  October  openings  came 
round,  and  still  there  was  no  summons.  In  her 
anxiety  she  went  to  the  office  of  the  Minister  of 
Fine  Arts  and  from  him  obtained  a  letter  re- 
leasing her,  in  two  days '  time,  from  her  obliga- 
tions to  the  Odeon.  Before  the  two  days  were 
up,  however,  she  received  from  Duquesnel  a  sum- 
mons to  a  rehearsal  of  La  Jeunnesse.  Re  jane 
hastened  to  see  him.  "Well,"  he  said,  "we 
shall  rehearse  to-morrow  at  one."  Eejane  re- 
plied that  she  had  one  at  the  Vaudeville  at  the 
same  hour.  Duquesnel  objected  to  the  loss  of 
his  promising  recruit  and  showed  an  official  let- 
ter bestowing  her  services  upon  the  Odeon. 
Gabrielle  in  turn  showed  the  letter  from  the  Min- 
ister. Duquesnel  was  forced  to  yield,  but  after- 
wards lodged  a  suit  in  which  the  Odeon  was 
awarded  damages.  '  '  So, ' '  said  Eejane  to  Jules 
Huret,  "if  the  Odeon  can  to-day  boast  its  velvet 
chairs,  it  has  me  to  thank  for  them." 

And  so  Eejane  began  her  career,  when  she 
was  less  than  eighteen,  with  a  two  years'  en- 
gagement at  the  Vaudeville.  Her  first  few 
roles 8  were  unimportant,  and  in  them  she  at- 

s  Her  first  appearance  at  the  Vaudeville  was  on  March  25, 
1875.  Her  first  three  parts  were  small  roles  in  La  Revue  des 
Deux-Mondes,  Fanny  Lear,  and  Vaudeville's  Hotel.  There 
followed:  Madame  Lili,  Midi  a  Quatorze  Heures,  Renaudin 
de  Caen,  La  Corde,  1875;  Le  Verglas,  Le  Premier  Tapis,  Lea 
Dominos  Roses,  Perfide  comme  L'Onde,  Le  Posse,  1876; 
Pierre,  Les  Vivocites  du  Capitaine  Tic,  Le  Club,  1877;  Le 
Mari  d'Ida,  1878;  Les  Memoires  du  Diable,  Les  Faux  Bons- 
hommes,  Les  Tapageurs,  Les  Lionnes  Pauvres,  1879;  La  Vie 
de  Boheme  Le  Pere  Prodigue,  1880;  La  Petite  Soeur,  Odette, 
1881;  L' Aureole,  Un  Mariage  de  Paris,  1882;  all  at  the 


144      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

tracted  no  particular  notice,  but  in  September 
(1875)  she  appeared  in  Madame  Lili,  a  one-act 
play  in  verse,  to  such  good  purpose  that  Sarcey 
wrote  of  her :  ' '  Mademoiselle  Eejane  is  charm- 
ing, with  her  roguery,  her  ingenuousness,  her 
tenderness.  This  pretty  and  piquant  girl  is 
spirited  to  her  fingertips.  What  a  piece  of  good 
luck  it  is  that  she  cannot  sing;  for  if  she  had 
a  voice  operetta  would  gobble  her  up. ' ' 

Yet  Eegnier  wrote  to  her  in  the  following 
April,  on  the  day  following  her  appearance  in 
Le  Premier  Tapis  (in  which  she  sang  an  inter- 
polated song  by  Lecocq) :  "I  was  really  aston- 

Vaudeville.  At  various  theatres:  Les  Demoiselles  Clochart, 
La  Princess,  Les  Varietes  de  Paris,  La  Nuit  de  Noces 
de  P.  L.  M.,  La  Glu,  1882;  Ma  Camarade,  1883;  Les 
Femmes  Terribles,  1884;  Clara  Soleil,  1885;  Allo!  Allot, 
Monsieur  de  Morat,  1886-87;  Decore,  Germinie  Lacerteux, 
Shylock,  1888;  Marquise,  1889;  La  Famille  Benoiton,  Le 
Mariage  de  Figaro,  La  Vie  a  Deux,  1889-90;  Ma  Cousine, 
1890;  Amoreuse,  Fantasio,  La  Cigale,  Brevet  Superieur, 
1891;  Lysistrata,  Sapho,  1892;  Madame  Sans-Gene, 
1893;  VilUgiature,  Les  Lionnes  Pauvres,  Maison  de  Poupee, 
1894;  Viveurs,  1895;  Lolotte,  La  Bonne  Helene,  Le  Partage, 
Divorcons,  1896;  La  Douloureuse,  1897;  Pamela,  Le  Roi 
Candaule,  Zaza,  Le  Calice,  Georgette  Lemeunier,  1898;  Le 
Lys  Rouge,  Mme.  de  Lavalette,  1899;  Le  Faubourg,  Le 
Beguin,  La  Robe  Rouge,  Sylvie  ou  la  Curieuse  d' Amour, 
1900;  La  Pente  Douce,  La  Course  du  Flambeau,  1901;  La 
Passerelle,  Le  Masque,  Le  Joug,  1902;  Heureuse,  Antoinette 
Sabrier,  1903;  La  Montansier,  La  Parisienne,  1904;  L'Age 
d' Aimer,  1905;  La  Piste,  1906.  At  the  Theatre  Rejane:  La 
Savelli,  1906;  Paris-New  York,  Suzeraine,  Les  Deux  Madame 
Delauze,  1907;  Qui  Perd  Gagne,  Israel,  1908;  Trains  de  luxe, 
L'Impe'ratrice,  Le  Refuge,  1909;  Madame  Margot,  La 
Flamme,  M' Amour,  1910;  L'Enfant  de  I' Amour  (at  the  Porte 
8t.  Martin),  La  Revue  Sans-GSne,  1911;  L' Aigrette,  Un  Coup 
de  TeUphone,  Agla'is  (at  Comedie  Royale),  1912;  Alsace, 
L'Irreguliere,  1913;  Le  Concert,  1914. 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  145 

ished  by  your  singing.  You  had  better  culti- 
vate this  talent,  which  I  didn't  know  you  had." 
Offenbach  also  heard  her  in  this  piece,  and  liked 
her  singing  so  well  that  he  offered  her  twenty 
thousand  francs  a  year  for  her  signature  to  a 
contract  at  the  Varietes.  Luckily  she  made  no 
attempt  to  break  her  contract  with  the  Vaude- 
ville. 

That  contract  she  renewed  again  and  again 
until  she  had  played  eight  seasons  at  the  theatre 
of  her  first  choice.  The  best  guide  to  her  grow- 
ing art,  and  to  the  beginnings  of  her  fame,  are 
found  in  her  letters  from  Eegnier,  who  followed 
her  career  with  loving  watchfulness,  and  often 
with  frank,  kindly  comment  on  her  work.  Their 
correspondence  forms  a  charming  chapter  of 
her  youth. 

Eegnier 's  birthday  fell  on  the  first  of  April. 
Every  year  Be  jane  wrote  to  him  on  March  31 
and  sent  him  some  small  gift.  In  the  year  when 
she  was  beginning  her  work  at  the  Vaudeville 
he  wrote  her: 

"  Ought  you  really  send  me  presents,  my 
child?  Do  I  need  assurances  of  your  affection? 
Do  follow  my  advice,  dear  girl,  save  your  money 
and  give  me  nothing  but  your  friendship.  That 
is  the  only  present  I  desire  from  you  and,  I  warn 
you,  it  is  the  only  one  I  shall  accept  in  the  fu- 
ture. You  hope  to  be  able  to  celebrate  my  birth- 
day for  many  years  to  come.  I  hope  so  too. 
You  will  never  have  a  better  friend,  a  better  ad- 
viser, and  no  one,  save  only  your  mother,  will 
ever  bear  your  welfare  more  at  heart.  I  thank 


146      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

you,  none  the  less,  and  with  all  my  heart  I  em- 
brace you. ' ' 

At  the  close  of  a  health-seeking  trip  she  took 
in  Holland  and  Belgium  in  the  summer  of  1875 
lie  wrote:  "I  knew  you  would  get  many  new 
impressions.  You  must  always  be  on  the  search 
for  like  ones,  for  your  spirit,  your  ideas,  your 
taste,  your  talent  will  thus  find  themselves. 
Frequent  our  museums,  stimulate  your  mind, 
read  a  great  deal,  even  do  a  little  writing. 
Such  is  the  intellectual  regimen  that  will  profit 
your  soul  as  the  exercises  I  have  advised  will 
benefit  your  gentle  body. ' ' 

Less  exalted  advice  comes  after  Le  Verglas 
and  Le  Premier  Tapis,  besides  the  commenda- 
tion of  her  singing  in  the  latter  piece :  '  '  Keep 
at  your  study  and  your  work  and  let  me  repeat 
that  it  is  the  simple  and  the  veracious  that  brings 
the  true  effect.  But  I  was  more  than  satisfied 
with  you  yesterday.  But,  please  remember 
your  carriage — don't  waddle  on  one  leg  and 
then  on  the  other;  don't  swallow  your  syllables 
and  your  words.  Pronounce  everything  with- 
out affectation,  but  also  without  negligence.  I 
embrace  you." 

After  she  had  been  a  year  and  a  half  in  har- 
ness, he  was  still  emphasizing  the  fundamentals. 
After  Le  Per  fide  comme  I'Onde  he  wrote  (No- 
vember 26,  1876) :  "You  are  very  pretty  and 
very  amusing  in  your  role.  .  .  .  You  are  a  com- 
edienne,— that  you  have  proved.  Between  our- 
selves, the  other  young  ladies  frightened  me  a 
bit.  Do  not  you  allow  yourself  to  fall  into  the 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  147 

general  carelessness  of  carriage  and  pronuncia- 
tion. Really  talk  to  those  to  whom  your  words 
are  addressed,  and  when  your  eyes  peer  into  the 
auditorium  remember  it  is  a  vacuum,  and  never 
talk  to  any  one  therein.  You  know  how  to 
avoid  this  fault,  so  look  out  for  it,  and  remain 
natural.  But  you  played  well,  were  applauded, 
and  deserved  to  be." 

Her  work  must  have  pleased  the  directors  of 
the  Vaudeville,  for  when  the  time  came  to  re- 
new her  contract  she  signed  for  nine  thousand 
francs,  a  considerable  advance  over  four  thou- 
sand. Her  mother,  however,  had  set  her  heart 
on  nine  thousand  six  hundred  francs,  and  her 
objections  threatened  to  break  off  the  negotia- 
tions. Rejane  promised,  however,  unknown  to 
her  mother,  to  repay  the  disputed  six  hundred 
francs  during  the  engagement. 

"I  economized  on  cress,"  she  relates.  "In- 
stead of  getting  two  boxes  at  three  sous  apiece, 
I  got  two  boxes  at  five  sous.  From  time  to  time 
I  put  fifteen  centimes  into  my  boots.  And  one 
fine  day  I  carried  to  the  managers  one  hundred 
and  fifty  laboriously  collected  francs.  I  must 
say,  to  their  credit,  that  they  wouldn't  take  the 
money.  But  my  mother  never  knew,  and  some- 
times, endeavoring  to  crush  me  with  the  supe- 
riority of  a  strong-minded  woman,  she  would 
say:  " There  now!  Without  me,  you  would 
never  have  had  those  six  hundred  francs. ' ' 

In  the  summer  of  1877  she  grew  nervous  over 
the  forthcoming  production  of  Pierre.  She 
wrote  Regnier  from  Abbeville:  "If  you  could 


148      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

only  give  me  one  hour  for  the  third  act  of 
Pierre.  The  nearer  the  time  approaches,  the 
more  I  fear  that  act — all  sentiment.  If  I  am 
unsupported  by  your  good  advice,  my  dear  mas- 
ter, I  cannot  answer  for  myself." 

Kegnier  was  eager  to  help  her ;  and  in  his  re- 
sponse he  gives  her  more  fatherly  advice:  "My 
greatest  wish  is  to  help  you  in  your  work.  .  .  . 
But  is  it  necessary  for  you  to  go  to  La  Bourbelle, 
where  you  will  stay  hardly  two  weeks?  The 
time  seems  to  me  much  too  short  for  serious 
treatment.  Can 't  you  simply  betake  yourself  to 
the  waters  of  Enghien? 

"Talk  this  over  with  your  doctor:  ask  him 
if  it  is  really  good  for  the  nerves  that  that 
abominable  musk  or  amber  odor  which  per- 
fumes your  letters  should  permeate  your  whole 
system.  No  doubt  the  odor  is  agreeable,  but 
still  that  is  a  matter  of  taste." 

The  premiere  of  Pierre  proved  the  first  crown- 
ing success  for  the  young  actress.  Immediately 
after  the  performance,  unable  to  restrain  her 
overflowing  joy,  she  wrote  to  Eegnier  this  en- 
thusiastic letter: 

"I  have  just  had  a  grand  succes,  and  I  don't 
wish  to  sleep  before  thanking  you,  to  whom  I 
owe  it.  I  have  never  been  so  happy  as  I  am 
tonight,  and  I  believe  that,  if  such  a  thing  is 
possible,  even  my  affection  for  you  has  grown. 
One  thing  alone  distresses  me,  and  that  is  my 
inability  to  repay  you  for  all  you  have  done. 
At  each  burst  of  applause,  I  thought  of  you, 
dear  master,  who  have  given  me  your  time  and 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  149 

made  sure  for  me  my  future.  No  affection  has 
ever  been  more  profound  nor  any  gratitude  so 
sincere,  believe  me.  Without  you  I  would  have 
been  nothing,  but  with  you — two  hours  ago  they 
told  me  I  was  an  artist !  I  can  open  my  heart  to 
you.  You  cannot  imagine  how  much  is  included 
in  that  one  word  "artist"  especially  to  a  young 
girl,  who  yesterday  had  doubts  about  the  future 
and  had  need  of  reading  all  your  letters  in  order 
to  give  courage.  ...  I  am  doubly  happy.  Do 
not  mistake  for  vanity  the  effects  of  the  great 
joy  I  have  been  experiencing.  How  I  would 
work,  dear  master,  to  do  you  the  honor  of  regis- 
tering a  multitude  of  such  nights!" 

But  good  parts  fell  to  Rejane's  lot  only  infre- 
quently. The  reigning  queen  of  the  Vaudeville 
was  Mme.  Bartet,  and  it  was  she,  naturally,  who 
got  most  of  the  leading  roles.  The  public  had 
begun  to  like  the  young  newcomer,  whom  it 
had  come  to  know  in  her  small  but  repeated  suc- 
cesses; but  nevertheless  she  was  kept  more  or 
less  in  the  background,  encouraged  only  by  Reg- 
nier  and  patiently  waiting  her  opportunities. 

It  was  in  this  fashion  that  she  spent  the  re- 
maining time  at  the  Vaudeville  until  she  left  it 
in  the  spring  of  1882.  That  period,  whatever 
dissatisfactions  it  brought  to  her,  is  not  without 
its  high  lights.  In  Le  Club  she  has  "un  vrai 
role/'  and  played  it,  with  gratifying  success,  a 
hundred  times.  In  April,  1879,  Mme.  Bartet 
fell  suddenly  ill,  and  with  only  a  few  hours  no- 
tice Rejane  assumed  the  older  woman's  role  in 
Les  Tapageurs.  When  Les  Lionnes  Pauvres 


150      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

was  revived,  in  November  1879,  her  Seraphine 
aroused  one  of  those  artistic  controversies  which 
delight  the  French  mind.  Sarcey  disapproved, 
for  once.  M.  Defere  advised  her  to  change  her 
costumer.  M.  Barbey  d'Aurevilly  on  the  other 
hand  said  she  recalled  Eachel  and  was  a  true 
artist ;  Augier,  the  author  of  the  play,  sustained 
her ;  and  stanch  old  Eegnier  wrote  her  at  length, 
discoursing  on  the  art  of  acting  and  of  his  affec- 
tion veritable.  Her  Mimi  in  La  Vie  de  Boheme 
again  saw  the  critics  at  odds  about  her. 

Altogether  in  her  eight  seasons  at  the  Vaude- 
ville, she  had  played  more  than  a  score  of  parts, 
some  of  them  genuine  successes.  Yet  she  had 
not  won  genuine  recognition  at  the  hands  of  the 
directors,  and  her  position  in  the  company  was 
hardly  in  accord  with  her  promise  and  deserts. 
Sardou  and  the  others  responsible  for  the  af- 
fairs of  the  Vaudeville  seemed  strangely  blind 
to  the  fact  that  in  Eejane  they  had  a  comedienne 
of  the  first  order.  But  though  she  was  by  her 
superiors  much  of  the  time  either  kept  idle  or  em- 
ployed in  almost  insignificant  parts,  the  rest  of 
Paris  speedily  knew  her  for  what  she  was.  She 
was  in  keen  demand  for  all  the  special,  semi- 
informal  performances  that  make  up  so  large 
a  part  of  the  artistic  life  of  the  normal  Paris. 
The  "  spectacles  "  of  the  Cercle  de  la  rue  Hoy  ale, 
the  revues  at  the  Epatant,  the  dramatic  trifles 
that  were  the  adjuncts  of  authors'  readings,  all 
found  in  Eejane  a  willing  and  able  helper.  She 
took  these  artistic  informalities  seriously,  re- 
hearsed for  them  and  costumed  them  with  care, 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  151 

and  was  so  particularly  well  adapted  to  the  work 
that  she  became  a  marked  favorite  with  the  very 
social  and  artistic  circles  to  which  the  Vaude- 
ville catered. 

As  the  directors,  however,  continued  to  give 
her  insignificant  parts,  it  is  not  strange  that  she 
listened  to  those  friends,  like  Pierre  Berton, 
who  urged  her  to  shake  the  dust  of  Vaudeville 
from  her  feet.  "You  are  a  star,"  Berton  told 
her.  It  happened  that  a  star  was  the  quest  just 
then  of  M.  Bertrand  of  the  Varietes  and  with 
him  she  signed  a  three  years '  contract. 

This  moment  may  be  said  to  mark  the  definite 
arrival  of  Re  jane.  She  was  no  longer  to  cool  her 
heels  in  the  greenroom  or  at  home,  and  hence- 
forth she  was  to  play,  as  a  rule,  principal  parts. 
Moreover,  the  agreement  with  the  Varietes  was 
elastic  enough  to  allow  appearances  at  other 
theatres,  often  in  plays  of  more  import  than  the 
light  material  of  which  the  Varietes  was  the 
avowed  medium.  And  when  she  returned,  on 
occasion,  to  the  Vaudeville,  it  was  not  in  minor 
roles.  Rejane  had  assumed  her  due  place  on  the 
stage  of  Paris. 

It  had  not  been  a  difficult  rise.  Though  it  is 
not  possible  to  overlook  the  elements  of  stead- 
fast ambition,  patience,  and  hard  work  in 
Rejane 's  early  career,  it  is  true  that  her  native 
spirits,  her  flair,  and  the  training  and  friend- 
ship of  Regnier  made  inevitable  her  right  to  a 
prominent  place  on  the  stage  of  Paris. 

With  that  place  assured,  we  see  her  thence- 
forth steadily  enlarging  it,  progressing  from 


152      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

part  to  part,  appearing  now  in  this  theatre  of 
Paris  and  now  in  that,  shortly  venturing  into 
the  other  capitals  of  Europe,  then  making  a 
tour — to  be  later  repeated — in  America,  and 
finally  acquiring  a  theatre  of  her  own  in  Paris, 
— an  international  figure,  a  queen  of  comedy. 

M.  Porel,  whom  Be  jane  afterward  married, 
has  given  a  graphic  account  of  one  of  her 
earlier  triumphs — and  a  typical  Parisian  first 
night.  The  play  was  de  Goncourt's  Germinie 
Lacerteux,  the  date,  1888 ;  the  theatre  the  Odeon. 

"Oh,  that  premiere!  The  beautiful  theatre 
was  crowded  to  the  last  inch  with  an  audience 
that  was  restless  and  seemed  none  too  good-na- 
tured. The  journalists  were  furious  because 
the  dress  rehearsal  had  been  behind  closed 
doors.  The  women  were  puzzling  themselves 
about  the  subject  of  the  play,  and  some  of  the 
literary  gossips  were  loudly  telling  all  they 
thought  they  knew.  The  cafetiers  of  the  neigh- 
borhood, disgruntled  because  the  usual  five  en- 
tr'actes had  been  cut  down  to  two,  were  pro- 
testing to  the  claque  against  the  change,  which 
interfered  with  the  sale  of  the  usual  five  bocks. 
Amid  the  confusion  of  the  lobbies  were  heard 
remarks  that  the  piece  was  impossible. 

"The  curtain  rises;  Bejane  makes  her  ap- 
pearance, with  her  arms  as  red  as  those  of  a 
kitchen-girl.  In  the  ball  gown  of  a  servant- 
maid  she  is  indeed  amazing.  This  little  scene 
she  plays  well,  and  wins  applause.  In  the  scene 
of  the  fortifications,  some  of  the  hissers  are  in 
evidence  before  she  enters ;  and  then  Eejane,  so 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  153 

prettily  modest,  plays  her  idyllic  scene  so  well 
that  the  delighted  audience  breaks  into  cries  of 
*  Bravo!',  and  the  curtain  is  raised  and  raised 
again.  ...  In  one  of  the  following  scenes,  some 
of  the  audience  refuse  to  listen  to  Mme.  Cros- 
nier ;  she  becomes  confused,  loses  her  head  and 
begins  over  again.  Some  cry  aloud,  some  laugh, 
some  hiss.  "Without  Rejane  the  piece  will  go  on 
the  rocks.  A  gesture,  a  poignant,  sincere  cry, 
and  Rejane  has  the  house  with  her  again.  They 
applaud  her,  they  recall  her  again  and  again. 
During  the  entr'acte,  there  is  a  stormy  time. 
Antoine  is  indignant  over  the  sneering  of  his 
neighbors  and  calls  them  scoundrelly  imbeciles. 
There  is  shaking  of  fists,  challenges  are  ex- 
changed, some  hiss,  others  applaud.  It  is  in 
this  atmosphere  that  the  scene  in  the  creamery 
begins.  Then  it  was  that  she  quite  won  the 
house.  She  is  again  recalled  again  and  again, 
applauded  by  the  whole  audience.  She  is  ac- 
claimed again,  after  the  fall  of  the  curtain  in 
the  scene  of  the  Rue  du  Roiher.  The  ladies 
were  completely  upset ;  they  wept,  they  clapped 
their  hands.  Even  without  Rejane,  the  two  last 
scenes  finished  themselves  somehow.  After 
that,  de  Goncourt's  play  was  to  live  more  than 
one  night;  and  after  that  Rejane  was  assuredly 
a  great  comedienne." 

Two  years  later,  when  Ma  Cousine,  a  comedy 
in  three  acts  by  Henri  Meilbac,  was  produced, 
Paris  saw  that  Rejane  had  again  made  extra- 
ordinary progress.  l '  Playing, ' '  says  M.  Huret, 
"in  a  vast  auditorium,  a  role  that  demanded 


154      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

large  dramatic  power,  she  responded  to  that 
demand,  and  exhibited  new  poise,  control  of 
voice,  and  exactness  of  articulation.  She  who 
had  heretofore  almost  expired  of  apprehension 
at  each  new  impersonation,  was  now  calm,  sure 
of  herself,  almost  indifferent.  She  sensed  the 
authority  that  had  come  to  her;  she  held  the 
audience  in  her  hand.  In  Decore,  in  Monsieur 
Betsy,  she  had  been  one  of  a  remarkable  trio 
of  actresses ;  now,  in  Ma  Cousine,  she  outshone 
her  confreres  at  all  points.  The  author  had  set 
her  the  difficult  task  of  playing  an  act  three  quar- 
ters of  an  hour  long  without  rising  from  her 
couch.  But  she  was  equal  to  the  occasion,  and, 
by  the  intelligence  and  sprightliness  of  her  in- 
flections, gestures  and  facial  expression,  she 
made  that  chair  itself  a  miniature  theatre. ' '  It 
was  in  Ma  Cousine  that  Be  jane  introduced  on 
the  boards  of  the  Varietes,  after  careful  study, 
a  bit  of  dancing  like  that  on  view  at  the  Ely  see- 
Montmartre;  "she  seized  on  and  imitated  the 
grotesque  effrontery  of  Mile.  Grille-d'Egout." 
In  other  words  the  sprightly  Gabrielle  per- 
formed a  veritable  can-can. 

A  little  later  M.  Meunier,  who  was  not  re- 
markable for  his  kindness  in  print  to  the  dean 
of  his  craft,  wrote :  '  '  Sarcey  's  exultation  knew 
no  bounds  when,  in  1890,  Be  jane  again  appeared 
in  Decore.  Time,  that  had  metamorphosed  the 
lissom  critic  of  1875  into  a  round  and  inert  mass 
of  solid  flesh,  cruel  Father  Time,  gave  back  to 
Sarcey,  for  this  occasion  only,  a  flash  of  youth- 
ful fire,  which  stirred  his  wits  to  warmth  and 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  155 

animation.  He  shouted  out  hardly  articulate 
praise ;  he  literally  rolled  in  his  stall  with  pleas- 
ure ;  his  bald  head  blushed  like  an  aurora  bore- 
alis.  'Look  at  her!'  he  cried,  'See  her  mali- 
cious smiles,  her  feline  graces,  listen  to  her  re- 
served and  biting  diction;  she  is  the  very  es- 
sence of  the  Parisienne!  What  an  ovation 
she  received!  How  they  applauded  her!  and 
how  she  played!'  From  M.  Sarcey  the  laugh 
spreads;  it  thaws  the  skepticism  of  M.  Jules 
Lemaitre,  engulfs  the  timidity  of  the  public,  be- 
comes unanimous  and  universal,  and  is  no  longer 
to  be  silenced. ' ' 

The  day  of  Eejane's  greatest  and  most  last- 
ing success  came  with  the  production,  in  1893, 
of  Madame  Sans-Gene,  by  Sardou,  the  latest  of 
the  Parisian  dramatists  to  answer  the  call  of 
the  great  comedienne  in  their  midst. 

' t  Just  as  the  first  dressmakers  of  Paris  meas- 
ure Ee  jane's  fine  figure  for  the  costumes  of  her 
various  roles,  so  the  best  writers  of  the  French 
Academy  now  make  plays  to  her  measure," 
wrote  M.  Meunier  in  1894.  *  '  They  take  the  size 
of  her  temperament,  the  height  of  her  talent,  the 
breadth  of  her  acting;  they  consider  her  taste, 
they  flatter  her  mood;  they  clothe  her  with  the 
richest  draperies  she  can  covet.  Their  imagina- 
tion, their  fancy,  their  cleverness,  are  all  put  at 
her  service.  The  leaders  in  this  industry  have 
hitherto  been  Messrs.  Meilhac  and  Halevy,  but 
now  M.  Victorien  Sardou  is  ruining  them.  Ma- 
dame Sans-Gene  is  certainly,  of  all  the  roles 
Eejane  has  played,  that  best  suited  to  bring  out 


156      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

her  manifold  resources.  It  is  not  merely  that 
Kejane  play  the  washerwoman,  become  a  great 
lady,  without  blemish  or  omission;  she  is  Ma- 
dame Bans-Gene  herself,  with  no  overloading, 
nothing  forced,  nothing  caricatured.  It  is  por- 
traiture; history. 

"Many  a  time  has  Eejane  appeared  in  cap, 
cotton  frock,  and  white  apron;  many  a  time  in 
robes  of  state,  glittering  with  diamonds;  she 
has  worn  the  buskin  or  the  sock,  demeaned  her- 
self like  a  gutter  heroine,  or  dropped  the  stately 
curtsey  of  the  high-born  lady.  But  never,  ex- 
cept in  Madame  Sans-Gene,  has  she  been  able  to 
bring  all  her  roles  into  one  focus,  exhibit  her 
whole  wardrobe,  and  yet  remain  one  and  the 
same  person,  compress  into  one  evening  the 
whole  of  her  life." 

What  sort  of  woman  presented  herself  to  the 
gaze  of  her  Parisian  admirers — and  soon  to 
American  eyes — at  this,  the  time  of  her  greatest 
triumph?  Whatever  other  gifts  she  brought  to 
her  work,  sheer  beauty  was  not  one  of  them. 
"Is  it  her  beauty?"  asked  M.  Filon,  seeking  the 
source  of  her  power,  and  of  her  perfect  under- 
standing with  her  audiences.  "Certainly  not. 
She  is  not  pretty;  one  might  even  say  .  .  .  but 
it  is  more  polite  not  to  say  it.  To  quote  a  fa- 
mous mot,  'She  is  not  beautiful,  she  is 
worse.'  "9 

» "Her  queer  little  face  catches  hold  of  you,  by  both  the 
good  and  bad  elements  in  your  nature.  All  the  intelligence, 
the  devotion,  the  pity  of  a  woman  are  to  be  read  in  her  won- 
derful eyes,  but  below  there  is  the  nose  and  mouth  of  a  sen- 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  157 

Though  Eejane  never  had  the  least  claim  to 
Mr.  Vance  Thompson's  rhapsodic  description 
of  her  as  "amazingly  and  diabolically  beauti- 
ful/' she  really  has  no  quarrel  with  the  fate 
that  made  her  as  she  is.  Comedy  was  to  be  her 
mission,  and  if  Wilde  was  right  in  his  dictum 
that  "what  serves  its  purpose  is  beautiful," 
beautiful  she  is,  after  all.  For  plain  though  it 
be,  her  face  is  a  true  comedy  mask.  ' '  There  is 
comedy  in  every  line  of  her  face,  in  the  arched 
eyebrows,  the  well  opened,  dancing  eyes,  the  tip- 
tilted  nose,  and  the  wonderful,  mobile,  express- 
ive mouth,"  says  William  Archer.  "This 
mouth  is  unquestionably  the  actress'  chief  fea- 
ture; it  conditions  her  art.  With  a  different 
mouth  she  might  have  been  a  tragedian  or  a 
heroine  of  melodrama,  which  would  have  been 
an  immense  pity.  It  is  not  a  beautiful  feature 
from  the  sculptor's  point  of  view ;  even  from  the 
painter's  it  is  not  so  much  a  rose-bud  as  a  full- 
blown rose.  It  has  almost  the  wide-lipped  ex- 
pansiveness  of  a  Greek  mask,  but  it  is  sensitive, 
ironic,  amiable,  fascinating. ' ' 

To  others,  her  eyes  have  been  her  chief  charm. 
They  are  large  and  gray,  changeful  with  the 
flexibility  of  Be  jane's  whole  nature,  surmounted 

sual  little  creature,  a  vicious,  almost  vulgar,  smile,  lips 
pouted  for  a  kiss,  but  with  a  lingering,  or  a  dawning,  sug- 
gestion of  irony.  Moreover,  she  is  exactly  the  reigning  type, 
the  type  that  one  meets  constantly  on  the  Paris  pavements 
when  the  shop  girls  are  going  to  lunch.  If  you  happen  to 
be  born  marquise  or  duchesse  you  copy  the  type,  and  the  re- 
sult is  all  the  more  piquant." — Augustin  Filon,  "The  Modern 
Frejich  Drama." 


158      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

by  extraordinarily  lofty  and  expressive  brows, 
and  often  half  covered  by  eyelids  almost  lan- 
guorous. Her  hair  is,  or  at  least  was,  golden 
brown.  She  is  not  tall.  She  is  by  no  means 
commanding  in  figure.  There  is  nothing  of  the 
imposing  stage  queen  about  her ;  yet,  in  figure,  as 
in  face,  she  has  been  perfectly  equipped  for  her 
work  as  comedienne  de  Paris.  Being  just  that, 
she  makes  her  hands  and  her  body  means  to  her 
histrionic  ends.  Those  who  have  repeatedly 
studied  her  art  have  found  the  subtlety,  the  dis- 
tinction, and  the  perfect  command  of  her  ges- 
tures and  her  poses  more  than  a  match  for  even 
the  brightness,  or  the  sadness  or  the  tenderness 
of  her  face.  In  every  critique  of  Be  jane  there 
crops  out  a  pointed  reference  to  her  wonderful 
fluency  and  flexibility  of  style,  her  fertility  of 
invention  of  expressive  detail,  the  naturalness 
of  her  transitions  of  mood.  "  Elasticity,  dex- 
terity and  rapidity  she  has  in  a  superlative  de- 
gree, and  with  them  grace  and  geniality,  to- 
gether with  simple  pathos  and  honest  heat  of 
temper.  And  of  course  she  possesses  that  pe- 
culiar fineness  of  taste  which  belongs  to  her  na- 
tion and  which  is  very  apparent  in  Madame 
Sans-Gene,  whose  heroine  may  be  crude  and  un- 
cultivated, but  is  never  boorish  or  clownish,  is 
awkward  but  not  ugly.  Her  voice  is  clear  and 
pleasant,  but  her  elocution  is  less  distinct  than 
that  of  many  other  French  artists,  although  her 
tones  mark  unmistakably  the  spiritual  and  in- 
tellectual differences  which  fluctuate  through  her 
speeches.  She  has  an  unfailing  regard  for  the 


GABRIELLE  KEJANE  159 

proportions  of  her  scenes,  and  never  obtrudes 
herself  into  a  prominent  place  just  because  she 
is  the  star  of  the  company. "  10 

We  have  heard  much  of  the  comic  finesse  of 
Re  jane's  Madame  Sons-Gene.  Now  listen  to 
one  acute  observer  (Arthur  Symons)  of  another 
side  of  her  genius:  "Re jane  can  be  vulgar,  as 
nature  is  vulgar ;  she  has  all  the  instincts  of  the 
human  animal,  of  the  animal  woman,  whom  man 
will  never  quite  civilize  .  .  .  Re  jane,  in  Sapho 
or  Zaza  for  instance,  is  woman  .  .  .  loving  and 
suffering  with  all  her  nerves  and  muscles,  a 
gross,  pitiable,  horribly  human  thing,  whose 
direct  appeal,  like  that  of  a  sick  animal,  seizes 
you  by  the  throat  at  the  instant  in  which  it 
reaches  your  eyes  and  ears.  More  than  any 
actress  she  is  the  human  animal  without  disguise 
or  evasion ;  with  all  the  instincts,  all  the  natural 
cries  and  movements.  In  Sapho  or  Zaza  she 
speaks  the  language  of  the  senses,  no  more.  .  .  . 
In  being  Zaza,  she  is  so  far  from  being  herself 
(what  is  the  self  of  a  great  actress?)  that  she 
has  invented  a  new  way  of  walking,  as  well  as 
new  tones  and  grimaces.  There  is  not  an  effect 
in  the  play  which  she  has  not  calculated ;  only, 
she  has  calculated  every  effect  so  exactly  that 
the  calculation  is  not  seen. ' ' 

M.  Filon  confessed  himself  baffled  by  the  ques- 
tion of  whether  Rejane's  marvelous  liquidness 
of  mood  and  method  is  due  to  something  essen- 
tial in  her  nature,  or  merely  to  an  incomparable 

10  The  Boston  Courier,  May  19,  1895. 


160      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

power  of  imitation.  "If  I  shut  my  eyes,"  he 
says,  "I  sometimes  think  I  can  hear  the  nasal 
intonation,  the  little  squeaky  voice  which  be- 
longed to  Celine  Chaumont.  A  minute  later  this 
voice  has  the  cadence,  the  sustained  vibration, 
the  artistic  break  with  which  Sarah  Bernhardt 
punctuates  her  diction,  and  the  transition  is  so 
skillfully  managed  that  all  these  different  women 
—the  woman  who  mocks,  the  woman  who  trem- 
bles, the  woman  who  threatens,  the  woman  who 
desires,  the  woman  who  laughs,  and  the  woman 
who  weeps — seem  to  be  one  and  the  same 
woman.  For  the  matter  of  that,  I  have  set  my- 
self a  problem  which  I  should  not  be  able  to 
solve  even  with  the  help  of  Re  jane  herself. 
Let  us  be  content  with  what  lies  on  the  surface. 
I  am  inclined  to  think  that  her  resources  con- 
sist of  a  host  of  petty  artifices,  each  more  in- 
genious and  more  imperceptible  than  the  last. 
If  one  studied  her  secret  one  might  draw  up  a 
whole  set  of  rules  for  the  use  of  comediennes." 
With  Sans-Gene  among  her  achievements, 
more  and  more  word  of  her  became  known  out- 
side of  France.  Unmitigatedly  French  though 
she  was,  though  there  was  little  in  her  to  sug- 
gest the  universal  appeal  that  has  made  world 
artists  of  other  actresses,  by  the  sheer  merit 
of  the  thing  she  did,  and  because  she  was  so 
complete  an  epitome  of  one  phase  of  her  nation 's 
art,  she  was  bound  to  become  an  international 
figure.  Her  first  appearance  in  London  was  in 
June,  1894.  Her  Sans-Gene  there  instantly 
won  her  the  recognition  she  deserved.  America 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  161 

had  not  long  to  wait.  On  February  27,  1895 
she  appeared  in  Madame  Sans-Gene  in  New 
York.  She  remained  there  several  weeks,  play- 
ing in  Divorgons,  Sapho,  Ma  Cousine,  the  one 
act  play  Lolotte,  and  Maison  de  Poupee  (Ib- 
sen's A  Doll's  House),  besides  Sans-Gene. 
Ten  years  later  n  she  made  her  second  and  last 
tour  in  America.  In  the  meantime  Belgium, 
Denmark,  Holland,  Germany,  Eussia,  Austria, 
Boumania,  Italy,  Spain  and  Portugal  had  all 
seen  her.  Begnier's  nose  rubbing  had  assur- 
edly been  to  good  purpose. 

One  may  as  well  admit  at  once  that  Bejane 's 
tours  in  the  United  States  were  not  successful, 
in  the  sense  that  continuously  crowded  houses 
indicate  success.  The  language  was,  of  course, 
one  stumbling  block,  for  a  keen  understanding 
of  the  foreign  tongue  was  more  necessary  for  a 
taste  for  Bejane  than  for  the  broad  effects,  say, 
of  a  Bernhardt  or  a  Salvini.  And  if  the  lan- 
guage fell  on  baffled  ears,  the  essence  of  the 
plays,  in  some  cases,  antagonized  the  more  puri- 
tanical of  our  public.  For  the  pieces  Bejane 
played  reflected  a  society  and  a  point  of  view 
for  which  many  Americans  found  it  hard  to 
muster  much  sympathy.  So  meager  was  the 
American  response  to  Bejane 's  art  during  her 
first  visit  that  she  forswore  us  forever.  Nine 
years  sufficed  to  make  her  change  her  mind. 

11  Her  second  American  season  began  in  New  York,  Nov. 
7,  1904.  During  this  tour  she  appeared  for  the  first  time 
in  America  in  Amoureuse,  La,  Passerelle,  Zaza,  La  Petite 
Marquise,  and  La  Hirondelle. 


162      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODEEN  STAGE 

"But  now  (1904)  as  then,"  said  the  New  York 
Times,  "she  is  hampered  by  the  moral  bias  of 
American  audiences,  and  by  the  fact  that  the 
manners  she  so  searchingly  studies  and  ex- 
quisitely depicts  are  exotic — foreign  alike  to 
our  sympathies  and  our  experience. ' ' 

Whatever  her  popular  success  in  America 
may  or  may  not  have  been,  Rejane — in  some  of 
her  parts  at  least — won  the  enthusiastic  praise 
of  the  critics  and  of  the  restricted  public  that 
knew  its  French  well  enough  to  meet  her  on 
something  like  Parisian  terms.  The  piece  de 
resistance  of  the  first  tour  was  Madame  Sans- 
Gene.  Like  most  of  Sardou 's  later  dramas,  it 
was  a  "  tailor-made "  play,  written  to  suit  the 
personality  and  methods  of  its  principal  ac- 
tress.12 A  secondary  object  was  evident  in  the 
effort  to  take  advantage  of  the  revival  of  inter- 
est in  Napoleon  that  marked,  for  no  evident  rea- 
son, the  early  nineties.  Technically  the  play 
was  interesting  chiefly  as  showing  the  author 
in  a  new  phase,  for  it  was  surprising  to  find 
Sardou,  a  notorious  disciple  of  Scribe,  writing 
a  piece  that  was  little  more  than  a  series  of 

12  Originally  Madame  Sans-G£ne  was  to  have  been  produced 
at  the  Grand-Theatre,  of  which  M.  Porel,  Rejane's  husband, 
was  manager.  He  gave  up  the  house,  however,  before  the 
play  could  be  given.  Other  managers  begged  for  it,  but  of 
each  in  turn  M.  Sardou  demanded:  "Have  you  Rejane  in 
your  company?"  and  as  the  answer  was  always  in  the  nega- 
tive, he  added:  "Then  there  is  no  use  of  our  talking  about 
it."  Soon  M.  Carr6  admitted  M.  Porel  to  a  co-directorship 
of  the  Vaudeville,  and  there  the  play  was  produced,  with  im- 
mediately great  success.  M.  Sardou  was  not  the  sole  author. 
He  had  considerable  help  from  M.  Moreau. 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  163 

sketches.  But  Rejane  lifted  the  whole  affair 
to  a  height  at  which  it  could  be  regarded  only 
as  one  of  the  triumphs  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury theatre. 

Rejane 's  freshness,  naturalness,  tenderness, 
and  charmingly  subtle  sense  of  comedy  as  Cath- 
erine Hubscher  in  Madame  Sans-Gene  was  in- 
stantly recognized  and  celebrated  in  every 
American  city  that  she  visited.  In  Ma  Cousine, 
a  light  farce,  she  acted  the  soubrette  Riquette 
with  an  abandon,  a  cleverness,  a  joyousness, 
that  emphasized  her  new  public 's  admiration 
of  her.  Her  Nora,  however,  in  Maison  de 
Poupee  (Ibsen's  A  Doll's  House),  revealed 
her  in  a  new  and  more  serious  light,  demonstrat- 
ing at  once  her  genuine  versatility  and  her  con- 
siderable emotional  power.  Even  the  unsavory 
Sapho  she  made  something  new  and  different, 
"moderating  its  excesses  and  enhancing  its 
better  moods.  Less  pathetic  directly  than  by 
suggestion,  she  often  moved  by  simple  means 
a  sympathy  which  Sapho  ill  deserved. " 

Just  before  Rejane  began  her  second  Ameri- 
can tour  she  had  an  unhappy  experience  in 
Havana.  She  gave  there  a  series  of  eight  per- 
formances, the  total  result  being  chronicled  in 
the  American  papers  as  a  "  fiasco."  She  had 
a  welcome  such  as  no  actor  or  actress  had  ever 
before  received  in  Cuba.  Thousands  gathered 
at  the  pier  as  a  private  steamer  went  out  to 
meet  her  and  bring  her  ashore;  formal  ad- 
dresses of  welcome  and  bouquets  were  showered 
on  her;  and  the  Havana  papers  were  full  of 


164      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

odes  and  eulogies.  The  first-night  audience 
that  gathered  to  see  Sapho  was  the  most  bril- 
liant ever  seen  in  Havana,  and  the  applause  that 
greeted  Rejane's  entrance  was  prolonged  and 
hearty.  But  the  audience  grew  colder  and 
colder  as  the  play  progressed.  The  next  day 
began  a  festival  period  for  the  dramatic  critics 
of  Havana.  They  pounced  upon  Sapho  and 
Daudet,  its  author,  and  declared  that  while  his 
sort  of  "esoteric  rot"  might  be  what  French- 
men regard  as  the  product  of  genius,  they  re- 
joiced that  such  stuff  could  not  pass  as  art  in 
Havana.13  Matters  grew  worse  with  La  Petite 
Marquise  and  Zaza,  the  company  and  the  medi- 
ocre productions  were  abused  ("What  did  the 
actress  mean  by  leaving  everything  except  her 
costumes  in  New  York?"  the  papers  asked. 
"Does  she  believe  that  'any  old  thing'  is  good 
enough  for  Havana?"),  and  the  young  ladies 
of  Havana  were  all  kept  away  from  Re  jane's 
improper  plays.  Personalities  became  fre- 
quent in  the  papers,  and  one  critic  boldly  as- 
serted that  Rejane's  star  had  set.  Her  man- 
ager made  matters  worse  by  revoking  the 
passes  of  one  paper,  the  lady  herself  provoked 
more  criticism  by  her  refusal  to  be  a  guest  at 
a  reception  at  the  Athena&um,  and  altogether 
affairs  reached  such  a  pass  that  every  one  was 
immensely  relieved  when  Re  jane  and  her  com- 
pany sailed  away  for  New  York.  The  whole 
incident  indicated  more  than  anything  else  the 

J3  Correspondence  of  Frederick  Roy  Martin  in  the  Boston 
Transcript,  November  9,   1904. 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  165 

narrow  outlook  of  the  Cubans.  "We  are  mak- 
ing our  political  independence  apply  to  every- 
thing/' wrote  one  of  the  critics.  "America  for 
the  Americans,  and  Cuba  for  the  Cubans !  Let 
the  foreigner  get  out ! ' ' 

When  Be  jane  reached  America  her  audiences 
found  that  she  could  not  altogether  conceal  the 
traces  left  by  the  flight  of  time — she  was  now 
forty-seven — but  that  she  had  suffered  no  loss 
of  her  vivacity  and  power.  The  tour  of  1904r-05 
was  not,  however,  the  improvement  over  that  of 
ten  years  earlier  that  had  been  hoped  for.  The 
enthusiasm  of  American  audiences  was  not  to 
be  won  over  by  the  cynicism  and  frankness  of 
such  pieces  as  Amoureuse,  though  the  critics 
were  not  slow  to  recognize  the  subtle  and  con- 
vincing quality  of  Bejane's  work  even  in  that 
play,  which  Mr.  Winter  gently  characterized  as 
"filthy  trash. " 

An  unexpected  circumstance  gave  new  em- 
phasis to  the  half-heartedness  of  her  welcome 
in  the  United  States.  It  was  simply  a  bit  of 
bad  luck  for  Be  jane,  an  injustice  to  a  distin- 
guished woman  and  artist,  and  an  illustration 
of  the  influence  of  American  newspaper  pub- 
licity. James  Hazen  Hyde,  then  in  the  public 
eye  because  of  his  share  in  the  insurance  scan- 
dals, was — as  he  has  always  since  been — a  gen- 
erous patron  of  the  American  study  of  French 
literature.  He  gave  a  dinner  in  New  York  to 
honor  the  actress  whose  claim  to  honor  none 
knew  better  than  he.  It  was  said  that  on  behalf 
of  himself  and  his  guests  he  gave  her  a  dia- 


166      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

mond  crown.  Accurately  or  not,  it  was  re- 
ported next  day — and  the  news  was  not  slow  in 
traveling, — that  Rejane's  gratefulness  and  Gal- 
licism took  the  form  of  her  doing  a  sprightly 
dance  on  the  table.  The  incident  was  not  im- 
portant, but  the  wide  publicity  given  it  did  not 
tend  to  increase  Rejane's  hold  on  that  part  of 
the  public  to  which  she  had,  on  her  merits,  so 
good  a  claim. 

To  get  all  the  scandal  over  with  at  once,  let 
us  dispose  of  Rejane's  husband.  In  1892  she 
had  married  M.  Porel,  who  had  been  an  actor, 
then  director  of  the  Odeon,  and  then  of  Grand- 
Theatre.  Soon  after  the  marriage  he  became 
co-director  of  the  Vaudeville  and  the  Gymnase. 
Early  in  the  marriage  there  were  two  children, 
a  daughter  and  a  son.  On  more  than  one  oc- 
casion Madame  Rejane  began  divorce  proceed- 
ings, which  were  halted  when  friends  intervened 
and  kept  the  couple  together  in  the  interest  of 
the  children  or  of  the  parents '  professional  wel- 
fare. Finally  both  sued  for  divorce.  After 
many  preliminaries  the  husband  was  granted 
the  decree,  though,  eventually  at  least,  the  chil- 
dren were  left  with  the  mother. 

Naturally,  the  Vaudeville  was  no  longer  open 
to  her.  But,  as  Arnold  Bennett  (then  not  yet 
the  distinguished  novelist)  wrote  in  P.  T.  O.,14 
though  "Rejane  may  now  and  then  suffer  a 
brief  eclipse,  she  can  be  absolutely  relied  upon 
to  emerge  in  a  more  blinding  glory.  Exiled 

i*  Dec.  29,  1906. 


GABRIELLE  R^JANE  167 

from  her  proper  home,  the  Vaudeville,  she  nat- 
urally wanted  a  theatre.  She  has  got  it.  She 
took  hold  of  the  Nouveau  Theatre,  the  unlikeli- 
est  and  one  of  the  most  uncomfortable  theatres 
in  Paris — the  Lamoureaux  concerts  alone  have 
succeeded  there.  She  removed  everything  from 
within  its  four  walls,  and  presently  frequenters 
of  the  Rue  Blanche  observed  that  the  legend 
Theatre  Rejane  had  been  carved  on  its  f  agade. 
Last  week  she  announced  to  her  friends  (that 
is  to  say,  to  Paris)  that  she  would  be  'at  home' 
on  such  and  such  a  night.  The  invitation  added, 
*  Comedy  will  be  played.'  Her  friends  went, 
and  discovered  the  wonderfullest  theatre  in  the 
town,  incredibly  spacious,  with  lounges  as  big 
as  the  auditorium,  wide  corridors,  and  a  scheme 
of  decoration  at  once  severe  and  splendid. 
Rejane  was  written  all  over  it,  even  in  the  cos- 
tumes of  the  women  attendants.  Paris  was 
charmed,  astounded,  electrified;  and  now 
Rejane  flames  a  more  brilliant  jewel  than  ever 
in  the  forehead  of  the  capital. ' 9 

There,  during  the  past  ten  years,  she  has  ap- 
peared in  more  than  a  score  of  new  plays,  none 
of  them,  perhaps,  a  new  Sans-Gene  or  Marquise, 
but  each  serving  to  keep  in  vigorous  use  one  of 
the  rarest  talents  of  the  time.  During  this 
time,  too,  she  has  acted  in  South  America 
(1909),  and  occasionally,  and  as  recently  as  the 
spring  of  1915,  she  has  gone  to  London,  where 
she  has  always  been  appreciated,  sometimes  to 
act  in  the  regular  theatres,  and  sometimes  to 
give  in  the  music  halls  one-act  pieces  like 


168      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Lolotte,  and  scenes  from  the  longer  plays.15 
"Madame  Re  jane  long  since  announced  to  the 
world,  by  publicly  going  about  with  a  grown- 
up daughter,  that  she  meant  no  more  to  de- 
pend for  even  the  smallest  part  of  her  charm 
and  her  power  upon  the  semblance  of  youthful- 
ness,  "  wrote  Mr.  Bennett  in  1906.  "She  is  a 
middle-aged  woman,  and  she  doesn't  care  who 
knows  it."  She  is  now  even  more  certainly  a 
middle-aged  woman,  but  she  still  has  much  of 
her  essential  vitality,  and  of  the  force  of  a  dis- 
tinguished personality. 

Off  the  stage  Madame  Bejane  has  always  been 
a  gracious  and  likable  woman,  of  a  gentle,  pol- 
ished manner  and  lovable  disposition  that  do 
not  always  go  with  a  pronounced  and  much  ap- 
plauded personality.  She  has  a  summer  place, 
"Petit  Manoir,"  a  large,  semi-Elizabethan  villa 
at  Hennequeville,  near  Trouville,  on  the  Nor- 
mandy coast.  There  it  has  been  her  habit  to 
live  quietly  whenever  her  engagements  per- 
mitted, with  her  daughter  Germaine  and  her 
son  Jacques.  She  has  always  indulged  a  taste 
for  objets  de  vertu.  "When  not  with  her 
children  or  at  the  theatre,"  says  Huret,  "she 
is  likely  to  find  time  to  go  in  search  of  paintings, 
or  books  or  fine  fabrics,  a  curious  old  fan,  a  bit 
of  unique  lace,  or  a  rare  flower  or  jewel,  with 
the  joyous  ardor  that  she  puts  into  everything 
and,  as  in  her  art,  spending  immense  energy  to 

is  In  1906,  she  attempted,  with  M.  Gaston  Mayer,  to  found 
a  French  repertoire  theatre  in  London,  but  the  experiment 
was  not  successful  and  lasted  only  one  season. 


GABRIELLE  REJANE  169 

achieve  the  exquisite  and  the  delicate,  in  a  word, 
everything  that  makes  for  the  joy  of  working 
and  of  life."  The  "joie  de  travaille"  is  one 
characteristic  of  the  great  comedienne  that  is 
likely  to  escape  the  casual  public.  But  work 
hard  she  did,  and  she  made  her  company  work 
hard.  "On  the  road"  it  was  the  regular  thing 
to  have  daily  rehearsals,  no  matter  what  famil- 
iarity with  the  plays  had  been  attained. 

"The  amazing  variety  of  her  artistry  has 
been  expressed,"  says  Huret,  "by  two  famous 
portraits  of  her,  one  by  Chartran,  the  other  by 
Besnard.  You  could  paint  nothing  more  strik- 
ingly truthful  than  these  portraits,  yet  you  can- 
not dream  how  unlike  they  are.  .  .  .  Besnard 
has  retained  only  those  traits  of  his  sitter  which 
give  her  an  expression  that  is  energetic,  even  a 
little  brutal  and  sensual, — the  popular  Be  jane, 
the  Be  jane  of  the  Ambigu,  of  realistic  drama, 
the  Be  jane  of  La  Glu  and  Germinie  Lacerteux. 
Despite  her  silk  gown  and  all  her  finery,  Bes- 
nard has  seen  her  with  the  down-at-heel  cloth 
boots  that  Germinie  wore  to  third-rate  balls, 
and  in  the  white  floss-silk  gloves  which,  to  get 
a  realistic  touch,  she  had  borrowed  from  her 
servant-maid.  That  Bejane  he  has  caught  ad- 
mirably ! 

"But  it  is  not  thus  that  she  has  appeared  to 
Chartran.  He  has  seen  her  in  a  dainty  lace 
head-dress  adorned  with  a  rose-colored  ribbon, 
her  hair  loose  over  her  eyes,  her  mobile  mouth, 
her  gracious  oval  face.  Above  all  he  has  seen 
her  extraordinary  and  complex  eyes,  now  quick, 


170       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

now  velvety,  now  perverse  beneath  their  large, 
languorous  eyelids :  eyes  that  are  mocking,  ar- 
dent, sparkling  and  dreamy.  This  is  the 
Rejane  of  Meilhac's  plays,  the  Rejane  who  is 
of  the  line  of  comediennes  of  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury ;  it  is  Ma  Cousine  who  is  about  to  become 
Amoureuse. 

"And  this  astonishing  complexity  of  tem- 
perament is  reflected  in  her  childhood,  in  her 
life,  and  in  her  tastes  to-day.  The  youngster 
who  passed  her  evenings  in  the  balcony  of  the 
Ambigu  sucking  an  orange,  who  stood  in  ecstasy 
before  the  glass  of  Adele  Page,  and  who  for 
years  dreamed  of  such  a  life  as  the  acme  of 
luxury, — her  one  sees  in  the  portrait  by  Bes- 
nard.  But  the  young  lady  of  the  Conservatoire, 
the  favorite  pupil  of  Regnier,  who  won  her  first 
success  in  L 'Intrigue  Epistolaire,  the  elegant 
and  finished  interpreter  of  the  life  of  the  salons 
and  cercles,  the  full-grown  artiste  of  Marquise: 
all  these  live  in  the  painting  of  Chartran." 

"Ces  deux  jolis  noms  d'u/ne  seule  et  meme 
personne:  Rejane,  Madame  Sans-Gene";  thus 
one  of  her  countrymen  happily  characterized 
her.  But  another  was  just  as  right  when  he 
called  her  "the  innumerable  Rejane." 


k  I 

•  \ 


ELEONORA  DUSE 


ELEONORA  DUSE 

WHEN  the  American  papers  announced,  in 
the  spring  of  1914,  that  Eleonora  Duse 
had  recovered  her  health  and  was  contemplat- 
ing a  return  to  the  stage,  the  news  had  a  curi- 
ous effect,  somewhat  as  if  the  New  York  press 
had  casually  said  that  "Ada  Eehan  and  Mr. 
Daly's  company  are  to  play  The  Taming  of  the 
Shrew  next  Monday."  A  little  later  the  cable 
brought  the  announcement  that  Bernhardt  was 
thinking  of  coming  again  to  America,  and 
though  Mme.  Sarah  is  almost  old  enough  to  be 
Duse 's  mother,  the  news  of  her  coming  had  not 
the  same  effect  of  turning  the  clock  backward. 
For  Bernhardt  is  apparently  one  of  the  earth's 
permanent  phenomena,  like  the  return  of  vege- 
tation in  the  spring;  while  the  tragic  figure  of 
Duse,  though  she  played  in  America  only  a 
dozen  years  ago,  seems  somehow  to  belong  to 
the  last  generation. 

She  is,  however,  not  yet  really  an  old  woman, 
for  she  was  born  October  3,  1859.  The  genius 
of  strange  and  hard  experience,  which  has  at- 
tended her  all  her  life,  was  present  even  at  her 
birth,  for  it  occurred  in  a  third-class  carriage  of 
a  railway  train,  near  Vigevano,  while  her  par- 
ents, the  members  of  a  band  of  actors,  were  on 

171 


172      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

their  way  from  Venice  to  Milan.    A  troubled 
life  then  began. 

For  two  generations,  at  least,  her  forebears 
had  been  player-folk,  of  a  rather  humble  sta- 
tion, most  of  them.  An  uncle  was  a  player 
differing  greatly  in  kind  from  his  famous  niece, 
for  he  was  known  throughout  Northern  Italy 
as  an  uproariously  funny  comedian.1  Her 
grandfather,  Luigi  Duse,  was  of  a  somewhat 
more  serious  turn,  and  of  a  more  important 
rank  in  the  profession,  for  he  is  said  to  have 
founded  the  Garibaldi  Theatre  at  Padua.  He 
founded  also  a  troupe  of  Venetian  dialect 
comedians  which  was  famous  for  many  years. 
His  four  sons  were  all  actors,  and  one  of  them, 
Eleonora  Duse's  father,  was  a  painter  as  well. 
Ultimately  he  left  the  stage  to  devote  himself 
to  that  art.  Duse's  mother,  too,  was  an  actress, 
and,  after  her  child  was  baptized  2  and  had  at- 
tained the  age  of  ten  days,  resumed  her  place 
in  the  company,  which  now  had  another  pro- 
spective member  added  to  its  roster.  Literally 

1  It  is  probably  for  this  comedian  that  the  street  Calle  Duse 
in  Chioggio,  near  Venice,  is  named. 

2  "A  curious  circumstance  attended  her  baptism  at  Vigevano. 
In  accordance  with  the  custom  of  the  country  the  child  was 
carried  to  the  church  in  a  shrine  gilded  and  ornamented  with 
jewels.     A  detachment  of  Austrian  soldiery  marched  past  the 
baptismal  procession,  and  mistaking  the  shrine  for  the  relics 
of  some  saint,  halted  and  saluted.     When  he  returned  to  his 
wife  the  father   said  to  her:    'Forgive  me,   dear,   that   I   am 
unable  to  bring  me  a  present  for  giving  me  a  daughter,  but 
I  can  give  you  a  happy  omen.     Our  daughter  will  be  some- 
thing great  some  day;  already  they  have  shown  her  military 
honors/  " 


ELEONORA  DUSE  173 

Duse  knew  the  theatre  and  its  people  from  the 
first  day  of  her  life,  and  was  forced  into  its 
service  as  a  matter  of  course. 

The  father  and  mother  were  humble  strolling 
players  who  wandered  about,  often  on  foot, 
making  a  scanty  living.  The  young  Eleonora  's 
childhood  was  thus  filled  on  the  one  hand  with 
poverty,  often  hunger,  and  on  the  other  hand, 
with  the  actor's  trade  under  her  observation 
and  a  part  of  her  daily  instruction.3  Hers  was 
really  not  a  childhood  at  all,  a  fact  that  helps 
to  explain  the  note  of  melancholy  and  tragedy 
that  has  pervaded  her  whole  life. 

A  career  as  a  stage  child,  however,  seems  to 
be  the  thing  that  produces  the  notable  actress, 
— the  Siddons,  the  Terry,  the  Mrs.  Fiske, — if 
only  the  added  something  is  present  to  endow 
the  unconsciously  absorbed  technique  with  the 
significance  of  personality  and  high  intelligence. 

At  seven  Eleonora  was  the  prompter  of  the 
company.  But  she  soon  began  to  absorb  the 
words  and  something  of  the  meaning  of  certain 
roles.  At  ten  she  was  playing  Cosette  in  Les 
Miser dbles.  By  the  time  she  was  twelve  she 
was  regularly  appearing  on  the  rustic  stages, 
often  impersonating  characters  far  older  than 
herself.  There  was  much  in  the  old  life  of  the 
strolling  players  that  made  for  joyousness — 
witness  Modjeska's  tribute  to  her  early  experi- 
ence of  such  life — and  the  young  Duse  was 

3  In  after  years,  when  she  had  won  fame  and  name,  she 
used  to  carry  about  a  little  antique  coffer  in  which  as  a  babe 
she  used  to  lie  while  her  mother  was  upon  the  stage. 


176      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

toire.  Duse  at  once  announced  her  intention 
to  play  in  the  same  piece.  The  resulting  nego- 
tiations with  Dumas  served  not  only  to  intro- 
duce some  of  his  plays — of  course  translated 
into  Italian — into  the  theatre  in  Italy,  but  to 
begin  a  warm  though  curiously  impersonal 
friendship  between  the  author  and  the  rising 
young  actress.  She  conceived  the  most  ardent 
admiration  for  the  man  and  his  work,  and  it 
was  not  long  before  he  was  urging  her  to  try 
her  fortunes  in  Paris.  Many  years  were  to 
elapse  before  she  was  to  make  that  venture,  for 
very  good, reasons,  as  will  later  appear.5 

Dumas,  it  would  appear,  and  the  success  with 
which  she  made  his  plays,  La  Princesse  de  Bag- 
dad 6  and  La  Femme  de  Claude,  understood  and 

6  Years  after  the  time  of  which  we  are  speaking,  the  two 
met  at  the  home  of  Dumas,  at  Marly.  When  she  found  her- 
self in  the  room  with  the  man  she  had  long  venerated,  she 
was  speechless  with  emotion,  and,  the  accounts  say,  burst  into 
tears.  When  she  finally  acted  in  Paris,  in  1897,  Dumas  was 
dead.  She  acted  there  on  the  occasion  of  the  great  testimonial 
to  his  memory.  See  page  188. 

6  In  the  last  edition  of  h's  plays  Dumas  appends  a  foot- 
note to  La  Princesse  de  Bagdad:  "There  is  in  the  last  scene 
a  stage  direction  that  is  not  found  in  other  editions.  After 
having  said  to  her  husband:  'I  am  innocent,  I  swear  it  to  you, 
I  swear  it  to  you,'  Leonetta,  seeing  him  incredulous,  places 
her  hand  on  the  head  of  her  son  and  says  a  third  time,  *I 
swear  it  to  you!'  This  gesture,  so  noble  and  convincing,  was 
not  used  in  Paris.  Neither  Mile.  Croizette  nor  I  thought  of 
it;  none  the  less,  it  was  irrefutable  and  irresistible.  Inflec- 
tion alone,  however  powerful,  was  not  enough."  As  a  matter 
of  fact,  until  Duse  introduced  this  bit  of  "business"  no  one 
had  ever  been  able  to  make  the  scene  convincing,  and  as  the 
success  of  the  whole  play  hangs  on  this  scene,  La  Princesse  de 
Bagdad  had  always  been  a  comparative  failure.  Dumas  goes 
on  to  pay  tribute  to  Duse  for  introducing  his  work  into  Italy, 


ELEONORA  DUSE  177 

liked  in  Italy,  had  a  large  share  in  restoring  her 
interest  in  life  and  her  work,  and  in  increasing 
her  fame.  She  was  rapidly  becoming  known 
throughout  Italy.  By  the  time  of  her  first  ven- 
ture outside  of  Italy — which  took  her  to  far- 
away South  America 7 — she  had  achieved  suc- 
cess in  Turin,  in  Kome  and  in  Milan. 

As  yet  there  was  little  thought  of  her  as  other 
than  an  Italian  for  the  Italians.  Dumas'  ap- 
peals to  act  in  Paris  had  always  been  in  vain. 
If  reports  of  her  acting  had  been  carried  home 
by  visitors  from  the  great  capitals,  she  was 
not  thought  of,  as  yet,  as  a  world's  actress. 
To  carry  plays  to  Moscow,  to  Vienna,  to  Berlin, 
and  act  them  there  effectively  in  a  foreign 
tongue,  an  actress  must  needs  be  of  great  power, 
must  have  a  genius  that  makes  itself  felt  above 
all  differences  of  speech.  In  1892  she  went  to 
Vienna,  comparatively  unheralded,  and  from 
there  word  went  forth  that  a  new  and  great 
actress  had  come  from  her  native  Italy  and 
blazed  into  a  sudden  glory.  Francisque  Sar- 
cey,  the  distinguished  French  critic,  had  fol- 
lowed the  company  of  the  Comedie  Fran- 
qaise  to  Vienna,  and  from  there  wrote  to 
the  Temps  accounts  of  her  display  of  versa- 
tility in  playing  equally  well  Antony  and 
Cleopatra,  La  Dame  aux  Camelias  ("Camille") 
and  Divorgons.  Sworn  admirer  of  Bernhardt 
that  he  was,  he  easily  found  faults  in  Duse, 

and  in  conclusion  says:  "It  is  to  be  regretted  for  our  art  that 
this  extraordinary  actress  is  not  French." 
7  1885. 


178       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

but  he  praised  her  justly  too:  "She  is  not 
handsome,  but  has  an  intelligent  and  ex- 
pressive face  and  wonderful  mobility  of  fea- 
tures. Her  voice  is  not  particularly  musical, 
but  its  occasional  metallic  vibrations  produce 
thrilling  effects.  Her  diction,  like  Mme.  Bern- 
hardt's,  is  distinct  and  clear,  each  syllable  com- 
ing out  with  well-rounded  edges. "  Though 
Sarcey  thought  her,  as  Cleopatra,  to  have  ' l  the 
air  of  a  crowned  grisette,"  (in  contrast  to 
Sarah,  who  was  "always  the  Queen  of  Egypt ") 
he  confessed  that  "La  Duse  carried  the  house 
by  storm  with  her  alternate  explosions  of  fury 
and  sudden  tones  of  touching  tenderness/' 
Sarcey 's  early  sympathy  for  Duse  was,  as  we 
shall  see,  to  be  of  benefit  to  her  later.  During 
this  transalpine  tour  Duse  acted  in  Eussia  and 
Germany,  as  well  as  in  Austria ;  and  now  was  to 
come  her  first  venture  in  an  English-speaking 
country. 

In  1893  Americans  interested  in  the  Euro- 
pean stage  knew  that'  Duse  had  achieved  fame 
in  her  own  country  and  had  succeeded  notably 
in  Austria  and  Germany.  The  average  Amer- 
ican theatregoer  knew  little  of  her.  Even 
those  who  had  heard  of  her  had  little  notion 
that  she  really  was  an  actress  of  the  first  rank, 
fully  worthy  of  comparison  with  Bernhardt  and 
[Modjeska. 

On  an  evening  of  January,  1893,  when  a  large 
and  brilliant  audience  assembled  at  the  Fifth 
Avenue  Theatre  in  New  York  to  see  her  in 
Camille,  the  prevailing  atmosphere  was  there- 


ELEONORA  DUSE  179 

fore  one  of  curiosity.8  Duse  had  not  long  to 
wait  before  striking  fire.  One  who  was  pres- 
ent said:  "Her  power  over  an  audience  was 
manifested  in  a  very  striking  manner  before  she 
had  been  on  the  stage  five  minutes.  The  actress 
had  scarcely  made  her  appearance  and  given 
her  careless  nod  of  recognition  to  De  Varville 
before  everybody  was  in  an  attitude  of  strained 
attention.  Already  the  old  and  hackneyed 
character  had  been  revivified  by  the  power  of 
genius.  Signora  Duse  does  not  attempt  to 
make  a  Frenchwoman  of  Camille,  but  fills  her 
with  the  fire  and  passion  of  her  own  Italian 
temperament.  But  both  the  fire  and  passion, 
except  at  very  rare  intervals,  are  kept  under 
complete  control.  Their  glow  is  apparent  in 
all  the  love  scenes,  and  breaks  into  flame  at  one 
or  two  critical  moments,  but  it  is  by  the  sug- 
gestion of  force  in  reserve  that  she  makes  her 
most  striking  effects.  Only  an  artist  of  the 
highest  type  could  create  so  profound  an  im- 
pression with  so  little  apparent  effort  or  fore- 
thought, by  some  light  and  seemingly  spontane- 
ous gesture,  by  a  sudden  change  of  facial  ex- 
pression, or  by  some  subtle  inflection  of  the 

s  Though  her  first  night  audience  was  described  as  "large 
and  brilliant,"  Duse's  audiences  during  her  first  American 
tour  were  generally  not  large  in  numbers.  They  were,  how- 
ever, drawn  from  a  discriminating  part  of  the  public,  the 
part  that  regards  the  drama  as  an  art  and  goes  to  the  theatre 
only  when  its  own  high  standards  are  likely  to  be  met.  Dur- 
ing the  1896  tour  she  attracted  the  same  discerning  public, 
but  also,  this  time,  that  other  public  which  runs  to  fads. 
"La  Duse"  became  something  of  a  fad,  but  happily  at  no 
sacrifice  of  the  quality  of  her  acting. 


180      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

voice.  The  chief  beauties  of  her  impersona- 
tion are  to  be  found  in  its  lesser  and,  to  the  in- 
experienced eye,  insignificant  details.  All  her 
by-play,  although  it  appears  to  be  due  only  to 
the  impulse  of  the  moment,  is  clearly  the  result 
of  the  most  deliberate  design,  and  changes  with 
every  variety  of  mood  or  condition  which  it  is 
meant  to  illustrate.  The  impetuous,  audacious, 
bored  and  querulous  Canaille  of  the  first  act  be- 
comes quite  another  creature  beneath  the  soften- 
ing influence  of  the  love  passages  with  Armand 
— such  love  passages  as  have  not  been  witnessed 
in  a  New  York  theatre  half  a  dozen  times  in  this 
generation — and  is  transformed  into  a  type  of 
placid  and  contented  womanhood  in  the  country 
home  of  Armand.  She  played  the  whole  of  this 
act  with  perfect  skill  and  profoundest  pathos, 
and  in  the  scene  of  parting  with  her  lover,  she 
suggested  the  heart-breaking  under  a  smile, 
with  a  simplicity  so  true  and  so  poignant  that 
her  own  suppressed  sob  found  many  an  echo  in 
the  audience."9  In  the  many  accounts  of 
Duse's  Camille  there  is  constant  reference  to  a 
simple  and  telling  interpolation  that  she  made 
in  the  scene  in  which  Armand  publicly  de- 
nounces her.  Where  other  actresses  have 
sought  to  express  Marguerite's  feelings  only 

9  The  Critic,  for  January  28,  1893.  The  story  has  often  been 
told  of  Mme.  Bartet,  the  distinguished  actress  of  the  Comedie 
Frangaise,  and  Duse's  swoon  in  La  Dame  aux  Camelias.  So 
powerful  and  so  natural  was  Duse  at  the  point  where  Mar- 
guerite swoons,  that  Bartet,  perhaps  sensible  of  Duse's  own 
bodily  weakness,  cried  out:  "Great  Heavens!  She  has  really 
fainted." 


ELEONORA  DUSE  181 

through  facial  expression  and  pantomime,  Duse 
spoke  at  intervals  during  his  tirade  her  lover 's 
name — "Armand!" — at  first  in  simple  in- 
credulity, then  in  fright,  then  in  deeply  hurt 
pride,  then  in  heart-breaking  anguish.10  Sar- 
cey,  however,  severely  condemned  her  for  mak- 
ing this  emendation,  which,  he  thought,  ruined 
the  naturalness  and  effectiveness  of  the  scene. 
Duse  had  come  unheralded,  but  her  few  weeks 
in  New  York  proved  a  genuine  "sensation." 
She  followed  Camille  with  Fedora,  in  which  she 
again  demonstrated  her  strange  power  of  creat- 
ing a  stirring  dramatic  effect  by  the  simplest 
and  apparently  the  most  unstudied  means.  As 
Clotilde  in  Fernande  she  presented  another 
type :  "The  change  wrought  in  her  by  the  dis- 
patch that  proved  her  lover's  perfidy  was  an 
extraordinary  illustration  of  suppressed  emo- 
tion, and  the  remorseless  deliberation  of  her 
manner  while  beguiling  the  faithless  Andre  into 

10  There  is  much  in  Mrs.  Fiske's  acting  to  remind  one  of 
Duse,  different  as  the  two  are  in  many  ways.  There  is  in 
each,  in  the  first  place,  the  same  service  to  an  art  of  an  ex- 
ceptional intellect,  the  same  high  minded  devotion  to  ideals. 
Each  has  been  a  mistress  of  the  subtleties,  both  of  conceptions 
of  characters  and  of  means  to  set  those  conceptions  forth. 
Each  depends  on  the  significant  repression  of  emotion,  rather 
than  on  expansive  exposition  of  emotion.  Each  is,  in  spite 
of  a  fundamental  seriousness,  expert  in  comedy.  Coming  to 
details,  each  depends  largely  on  rapidity  of  utterance,  with 
occasional  arbitrary  pauses.  Of  the  former — in  a  possible 
excess — Mrs.  Fiske  has  been  sufficiently  charged;  the  latter 
Duse  has  been  sometimes  accused  of  carrying  to  undue  lengths. 
Finally  each  has  her  wholesome  distaste  for  eccentricities  and 
meritricious  publicity.  Mrs.  Fiske  is  Duse  translated  into 
American. 


182      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

the  net  which  she  had  spread  for  him  was  in- 
tensely eloquent  of  a  woman  scorned.  Not  un- 
til after  the  marriage  had  been  accomplished 
did  she  give  vent  to  the  rage  which  she  had  re- 
strained so  long;  but  when  the  floodgates  of 
passion  were  once  opened,  the  torrent  of  her 
wrath  and  hate  and  scorn  might  almost  be  called 
appalling.  This  one  revelation  of  her  power 
would  place  her  instantly  in  the  front  rank 
of  emotional  actresses. " n  Another  jealous 
woman  was  revealed  in  Santuzza  in  Cavalleria 
Rusticana.  Astonishing  in  this  part  was  the 
complete  sinking  of  Her  own  personality  in  that 
of  a  peasant  woman.  By  voice,  walk,  subtle 
suggestions  of  gesture  and  pose,  she  achieved 
a  masterpiece  in  what  the  French  call  "getting 
within  the  skin"  of  a  character.  When  to  the 
other  impersonations  she  added  her  Mirando- 
lina  in  La  Locandiera,  a  part  calling  for  a 
charming  archness  and  humor,  and  as  sure  a 
touch  in  comedy  as  Santuzza  in  tragedy,  her 
wide  range  was  astonishingly  revealed.12 

11  The  Critic,  February  11,  1893. 

12  During  her  tour  in  America  in  1893,  Duse's  parts  were: 
Marguerite    Gauthier    in    La   Dame   aux   Camillas;    Fedora; 
Clotilde    in    Fernande;    Santuzza    in    Cavalleria    Rusticana; 
Mirandolina    in    La    Locandiera;    Cyprienne    in    Divorcons; 
Francine  in  Francillon,  and  Ce"sarine  in  La  Femme  de  Claude. 
During  her  second  American  tour  in  1896,  Duse  played  Magda 
for  the  first  time  in  this  country,  and  also  some  plays  from 
her    former    repertoire,    La    Dame    aux    Cam£lias,    Cavalleria 
Rusticana,  and  La  Locandiera.     On  her  next  visit,   in   1902, 
which    was    during   the    d'Annunzio    period,    she    played    La 
Gioconda,  La  Citta  Morta,  and  Francesca  da  Rimini,  all  by 
d'Annunzio. 


ELEONORA  DUSE  183 

After  visiting  a  few  other  American  cities, 
Duse's  company  arrived  in  London,  and  opened 
an  engagement  there  in  May  (1893).  She  was 
the  first  Italian  since  Salvini  to  claim  London's 
serious  attention.  She  was  at  least  as  un- 
known there  to  "the  general"  as  she  had  been 
in  New  York,  though  of  course  there  were  many 
who  had  either  seen  her  on  the  continent  or  had 
read  glowing  accounts  of  her.  But  there  were 
many,  at  first,  to  ask:  "Who  is  she?"  When 
she  made  her  presence  felt,  as  she  promptly 
did,  there  arose  a  fine  critical  storm  with  her  as 
the  center.  Bernhardt  was  idolized  in  London, 
appeared  there  in  the  same  season,  and  natu- 
rally comparison  was  rife.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
comparison  between  Duse  and  Bernhardt,  both 
of  whom  were  well  within  their  prime  in  the 
early  nineties,  was  one  of  the  favorite  intellec- 
tual amusements  of  the  day,  with  both  profes- 
sional and  amateur  critics.  Duse  succeeded  in 
London,  however,  as  she  had  succeeded  else- 
where.13 

Thus  had  she  swung  about  the  world,  making 
known  her  great  gifts,  and  firmly  establishing 
a  genuine,  honestly  won  fame.  Only  Paris  re- 
mained to  be  conquered,  and  before  she  at- 
tempted that  formidable  task,  she  visited  Amer- 
ica again.14 

is  She  played  for  London  A  Doll's  House  and  Antony  and 
Cleopatra,  as  well  as  Camille,  Fedora,  Cavalleria  Rusticana 
and  La  Locandiera. 

i*  When  Duse  was  in  the  United  States  for  the  second  time, 
in  1896,  she  withstood,  as  before,  all  attempts  to  interview 
her.  This  fact  did  not  prevent  some  enterprising  persons  from 


184      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Now,  at  last,  came  Duse's  invasion  of  Paris. 
Why  was  it  delayed  so  long?  What  were  the 
circumstances  of  her  going?  And  how  did  she 
fare  there?  The  answers  to  these  questions 
form  a  curious  chapter  in  her  history,  and 
in  that  of  a  great  sister  artist.  Duse's  few 
weeks  in  Paris  in  the  early  summer  of  1897 
mark  the  climax  of  her  career,  and  may  well  be 
described  in  some  detail. 

It  is  an  established  tenet  of  Parisian  faith 
that  nothing  in  the  artistic  world  can  really  be 
said  to  have  won  the  stamp  of  authentic 
achievement  until  it  has  been  seen  and  approved 
by  Paris.  With  much  justification,  surely,  the 

publishing  to  the  world  that  she  had  confessed  a  dislike  of 
America.  The  report  was  widely  spread,  but  the  fact  was 
that  Duse  did  not  make  the  statement. 

Her  Magda  gave  a  new  revelation  of  her  skill.  "In  sug- 
gesting the  social  standing  of  the  returned  prodigal,  Mme. 
Duse  takes  a  middle  course  between  the  frank  Bohemianism 
of  Bernhardt  and  the  loftier  aristocratic  air  adopted  by 
Modjeska.  It  is  interesting  to  note  how  she  emphasizes 
the  theatrical  nature  of  Magda's  past  life,  by  just  those 
little  exaggerations  of  pose  and  gesture  common  to  nearly 
all  stage  performers,  but  from  which  she  herself,  in  ordi- 
nary conditions  is  almost  ideally  free.  These  manifesta- 
tions of  self-consciousness  are  confined  to  the  second  act,  and 
vanish  when  the  inner  self  of  the  woman  is  brought  to  the 
surface  by  the  influence  of  powerful  emotions." — The  Critic, 
March  7,  1896.  An  instance,  this,  of  Duse's  remarkable  sub- 
tlety in  acting.  At  the  point  where  Magda  drives  her  former 
lover  from  her  presence,  she  "easily  reached  and  maintained 
herself  at  a  height  of  emotion  which  can  only  be  described 
as  tragic,  and  she  wrought  the  effect  without  exposing  her- 
self, even  for  an  instant,  to  the  charge  of  exaggeration  or 
rant."  Of  this  scene  William  Archer,  a  little  later,  said  that 
until  he  saw  it  he  did  not  fully  realize  the  dynamic  potentiali- 
ties of  human  utterance. 


ELEONORA  DUSE  185 

French  are  likely  to  consider  themselves  final 
arbiters,  and  they  do  not  go  out  of  their  way 
to  discover  merit  in  a  foreigner  who  has  not  yet 
shown  his  art  in  ' i  the  home  of  art. ' y 

Paris  had  heard  the  echoes  of  Duse's  achieve- 
ments, then,  with  the  comfortable  feeling  that 
if  she  really  amounted  to  anything  she  would 
come  to  Paris  and  prove  it.  Until  then  Pari- 
sians could  wait.  Duse  was  known  to  be  the 
best  Italian  actress,  Dumas '  interest  in  her  had 
been  evidenced  years  before,  and  her  success 
in  the  large  European  cities  and  in  America  and 
England  was  by  no  means  unknown.  But  the 
occasional  whisper  that  Duse  was  comparable 
to  Bernhardt  herself  brought  only  indulgent 
smiles.  The  lady  evidently  avoided  the  test. 

That  she  had  avoided  the  test  was  true. 
Duse  had  been  really  afraid  to  go  to  Paris. 
Later,  after  she  had  won  the  day,  she  admitted 
as  much.  A  failure  in  Paris  would  be,  she  rec- 
ognized, a  fatal  blow  to  her  prestige  and  am- 
bitions. 

When  Dumas  had  urged  her  to  try  her  for- 
tunes in  the  French  capital,  he  assumed  that 
she  would  act  in  French.  But  Duse  knew  how 
sensitive  were  French  ears  to  the  niceties  of  the 
language,  how  dependent  on  purity  and  beauty 
of  speech  was  much  of  the  drama  to  which  they 
were  accustomed,  and  how  she  would  be  placing 
herself  under  a  heavy  handicap  in  acting  in  a 
strange  medium. 

It  was  not,  then,  until  in  Austria,  Eussia, 
England  and  the  United  States  she  had  been 


186      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

warmly  received  while  acting  in  her  native 
tongue,  that  the  conquest  of  Paris  began  to 
seem  possible. 

Enter  now,  Sarah  Bernhardt.  Mme.  Sarah, 
unlike  most  Parisians,  had  seen  Duse  and  knew 
her  quality.  She  knew  the  truth  of  the  growing 
impression  that  Duse  was  really  a  worthy  rival. 
Therefore,  if  Duse  was  really  coming  to  Paris, 
Sarah  wished  to  involve  herself  in  the  proceed- 
ings, and  protect  her  position.  It  was  an- 
nounced that  where  others  had  failed  to  induce 
Duse  to  come  to  Paris,  Bernhardt  had  suc- 
ceeded. More,  she  had  offered  Duse  the  use 
of  her  own  theatre.  Thus  Duse  was  put  at  once 
in  the  position  of  protegee,  and  the  press  re- 
sounded with  praises  of  Sarah's  magnanim- 
ity. 

Duse  chose  Magda  for  her  first  appearance. 
It  was  a  part  well  suited  to  her,  and  in  it  she 
had  less  to  fear  in  comparison  with  Bernhardt, 
who  had  never  scored  so  heavily  with  it  as  with 
her  other  roles.  Bernhardt  forthwith  called  on 
Duse,  and  the  announcement  at  once  followed 
that  the  opening  performance  was  to  be  changed 
to  La  Dame  auoc  Cornelias  (Camille).  What- 
ever the  honesty  of  Bernhardt  Js  motives,  she 
had  succeeded  in  inducing  Duse  to  appear  first 
in  a  part  that  was  one  of  Sarah's  own  triumphs. 
One  can  imagine  the  new  security  that  Bern- 
hardt felt. 

The  house  was  crowded  with  the  most  bril- 
liant audience  that  Paris  could  muster.  Word 
had  gone  forth  that  one  was  to  appear  who  had 


ELEONORA  DUSE  187 

been  mentioned  in  the  same  breath  with  the 
idolized  Bernhardt.  Kochefort  was  there,  and 
so  was  Halevy,  and  Got,  the  doyen  of  the 
Frangaise,  and  a  throng  of  the  distinguished 
men  and  women  of  the  Paris  of  the  day.  For 
the  critics,  Lemaitre  was  there,  and  Catulle 
Mendes,  and,  most  important,  Francisque  Sar- 
cey.  Sarah  herself  was  there,  holding  court, 
and  serene  and  smiling  in  her  role  of  protecting 
friend. 

The  story  of  that  first  performance  is  soon 
told.  It  was  a  disappointment.  During  the 
first  act  Duse  was  almost  painfully  nervous ;  in 
the  second  she  showed  flashes  of  power,  and 
won  some  mild  enthusiasm ;  in  the  third  she  was 
listened  to  only  with  patience;  in  the  fourth 
the  audience  took  more  pleasure  in  Ando,  her 
" leading  man,"  than  in  Duse  herself;  in  the 
fifth  she  played  the  death  scene  beautifully,  but 
it  was  too  late.  "If  someone  had  triumphed  it 
was  not  Duse." 

Already  Paris  thought  that  it  had  taken 
Duse's  measure,  and  now  that  the  alleged  com- 
parison with  Bernhardt  was  disposed  of  set- 
tled back  to  enjoy  her,  if  possible,  for  her 
own  sake.  Magda  followed.  The  critics  were 

little  more  impressed.     Sarcey  in  particular 

his  criticism  always  appeared  after  a  few 
days'  interval — poured  balm  on  Duse's  feelings. 
He  began  to  see  that  all  had  not  yet  been  told. 
"  Every  one,"  he  wrote,  "was  delighted  to  see 
so  much  naturalness  combined  with  such  great 
force  of  feeling.  ...  I  think  I  am  beginning 


188      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

to  distinguish  the  characteristic  traits  of  her 
peculiar  talent." 

After  the  first  performance  of  Magda,  Duse 
had  been  suddenly  taken  ill.  Immediately 
after  Sarcey's  encouraging  article — whether 
or  not  it  was  the  cause,15 — she  recovered  and 
was  ready  for  the  lists  again. 

Bernhardt  grew  apprehensive.  She  pro- 
posed a  gala  performance  in  aid  of  the  fund 
for  a  memorial  to  Dumas.  She  announced  that 
she  would  give  the  last  two  acts  of  La  Dame 
aux  Camelias,  and  that  Duse  had  been  asked  to 
give  the  second  and  third  acts  of  the  same  play. 
Now  the  third  act  was  the  point  where  Duse 
had  most  signally  failed  to  please  Paris  on  that 
memorable  first  night.  She  was  by  now  wary 
of  Bernhardt 's  "friendship,"  and  said  that 
while  she  was  eager  to  appear  in  honor  of 
Dumas,  she  would  substitute  the  second  act  of 
La  Femme  de  Claude.  And  on  this  substitu- 
tion she  insisted  in  spite  of  all  Mme.  Sarah 
could  say. 

The  audience  had  anticipated  a  rare  feast  of 
acting  and  was  not  disappointed.  It  ap- 
plauded both  actresses  to  the  echo.  But  no- 
tice how  Sarah  worked  into  this  occasion  an 
element  that  had  reference  not  so  much  to  the 
glorification  of  Dumas  as  to  the  glorification  of 
herself:  "The  curtain  rises  to  disclose  the 
celebrated  bust  of  Dumas,  by  Carpeaux,  which 
occupies  the  center  of  the  stage.  Grouped 

IB  Unlike  many  of  her  sister  actresses,  Duse  made  a  practice 
of  reading  the  criticisms  of  her  acting. 


ELEONORA  DUSE  189 

about,  at  a  respectful  distance,  are  all  the  art- 
ists who  have  taken  part  in  the  performance, 
while  in  advance  of  all,  face  to  face  with  the 
bust  itself,  stands  Sarah  Bernhardt.  She  still 
wears  the  costume  of  Marguerite  Gauthier,  and 
is  there  as  the  accepted  symbol,  the  unrivaled 
personification  of  Dumas'  immortal  creation. 
Duse  is  in  the  background  along  with  the 
others. 

"A  poem  has  been  composed  especially  for 
the  occasion  by  Edmond  Eostand,  in  which 
Bernhardt  is  allowed  to  address  Dumas  in  a 
tone  of  familiar  grandeur,  as  befits  one  genius 
in  the  presence  of  another.  After  one  expres- 
sive pause,  therefore,  she  changes  her  attitude 
and  begins. 

"  'She  recites  these  exquisite  verses  [the 
account  in  the  Gaulois  said]  with  a  charm  of 
tenderness,  an  intensity  of  feeling,  that  arouse 
new  transports  of  enthusiasm.  The  whole  au- 
dience is  on  its  feet,  quivering,  with  arms  out- 
stretched toward  the  prodigious  artiste,  who 
makes  an  effort  to  bow,  but  is  overcome  by  the 
force  of  her  emotion.  The  curtain  rises  and 
falls  an  incalculable  number  of  times,  disclosing 
the  great  tragedienne  in  her  gracious  attitude 
of  homage  to  the  great  dramatist.  And  then, 
with  a  movement  of  touching  spontaneity,  Sarah 
goes  to  La  Duse,  seizes  her  hand,  and  both  in- 
cline before  the  bust  of  the  master.  The  spec- 
tacle is  one  that  will  never  be  forgotten.'  " 16 

16  From  Victor  Mapes'  Duse  and  The  French,  to  which  the 
author  is  indebted  for  his  account  of  Duse's  Paris  debut. 


190      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

How  very  Gallic!  And  how  extremely  ef- 
fective as  an  apotheosis  of  Bernhardt!  With 
Duse  triumphantly  subordinated  by  means  of 
Bernhardt 's  apparently  magnanimous  demon- 
strations of  friendship,  and  with  the  Paris  sea- 
son practically  at  an  end,  Mme.  Sarah  left  town 
and  repaired  to  England. 

In  spite  of  all,  Duse  went  on.  In  rapid  suc- 
cession she  played  La  Locandiera,  Sogno  di  un 
Mattino  di  Primavera  (a  new  play  by  d'An- 
nunzio),  La  Femme  de  Claude,  and  Cavalleria 
Rusticana. 

A  curious  thing  happened.  Her  great  first- 
night  audience  Duse  had  not  been  able  to  over- 
whelm. Now,  by  the  slow-working  influence  of 
her  very  genuine  art,  she  gained  a  cumulative 
hold  on  the  imagination  and  affection  of  the 
Paris  public.  An  open  letter  to  her,  signed 
"Sganarelle,"  appeared  in  Le  Temps,  appeal- 
ing to  her  to  give  a  final  matinee  especially  for 
her  brother  and  sister  artists  to  whom  "her 
methods  had  opened  new  horizons."  "Sgana- 
relle"  proved  to  be  Sarcey.  His  project  was 
taken  up  with  an  enthusiasm  that  told  how  ef- 
fective, after  all,  had  been  Duse's  unobtrusive 
art.  Lavrouniet,  in  Figaro,  speaking  of  Bern- 
hardt and  Duse,  in  a  few  sentences  admirably 
characterized  the  art  of  both.  The  former,  he 
says,  "from  a  constant  desire  to  be  unique, 
supplies  all  the  highest  and  rarest  expressions 
of  art,  except  one — simplicity.  In  La  Duse,  we 
have  seen  on  the  stage  a  woman's  nature  and 
that  of  an  artiste  completing  each  other — the 


ELEONORA  DUSE  191 

artiste  playing  with  all  the  sensitiveness  of  a 
woman,  and  the  woman  allowing  herself  to  be 
entirely  absorbed  in  the  artiste."  Lemaitre 
also  wrote  sympathetically:  "She  came  to  us, 
preceded  by  a  European  reputation  a  rival  sis- 
ter of  the  great  Sarah.  We  were  not  deceived, 
for  Duse  is  a  dramatic  artiste,  original  to  the 
core,  and  of  the  first  rank.  We  were  told  she 
was  beyond  everything  an  astonishing  realist; 
that  she  lived  her  parts  rather  than  played 
them,  and  in  this  way  took  her  audience  by 
storm.  And  that  statement  is  doubtless  exact. 
.  .  .  What  seems  to  me  incontestably  Mme. 
Duse's  is  her  singular  charm  and  grace,  her 
sweetness  and  tenderness.  On  that  account 
her  search  for  the  truth,  her  solicitude  to  avoid 
the  exhibition  of  any  artifice,  her  realism,  so 
very  minute  and  so  very  sincere,  reach  even  to 
poetry.  Hers  is  the  unique  charm  of  a  ma- 
tured woman, — impassioned,  bruised,  suffering, 
nervous, — in  whom,  however,  survives  a  young 
and  ingenuous  grace,  almost  that  of  a  young 
girl,  of  a  strange  young  girl." 

Duse  promptly  and  gladly  accepted  the  invi- 
tation to  give  the  special  matinee.  Her  lease 
of  Bernhardt's  theatre  had  expired  and  it  was 
necessary  to  write  to  England  to  ask  the  use 
of  the  house.  Bernhardt  tendered  it  gratui- 
tously, but,  wishing  still  to  have  a  share  in  all 
that  was  going  on,  requested  that  the  invita- 
tions bear  her  name  and  Duse's  side  by  side. 
Duse  saw  difficulties.  "I  could  not  invite  my 
companions  in  France  to  come  and  admire  me. 


192      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

That  would  be  too  presumptuous."  When 
Sarah  could  not  have  her  way,  she  suggested 
that  the  performance  be  abandoned.  Instead, 
the  Porte  St.  Martin  was  secured.  The  news- 
papers got  wind  of  the  negotiations  that  Duse's 
manager  and  Bernhardt  had  been  carrying  on 
by  telegraph,  and  when  the  latter 's  motives 
became  apparent,  there  was  another  reaction 
in  favor  of  Duse.  There  was  room  in  the  Porte 
St.  Martin  for  only  one-tenth  of  the  applicants 
for  seats,  and,  when  the  day  arrived,  the  audi- 
ence seemed  to  Sarcey  "like  a  violin  whose 
strings  are  tightened  and  ready  to  vibrate  un- 
der the  bow."  "It  was  the  first  time,"  he 
wrote,  "I  have  seen  an  audience  thus  formed 
and  in  such  a  frame  of  mind.  There  was  no 
artificial  commotion ;  it  was  expectation,  full  of 
security  and  joy."  Of  what  followed  Jules 
Huret  wrote  in  Figaro:  "I  am  afraid  of  my 
incompetence  to  describe  the  powerful,  the  pro- 
found emotion  of  those  three  hours,  where  an 
entire  audience  composed  of  the  flower  of 
French  comedians,  of  well-known  writers,  great 
painters  and  celebrated  sculptors,  honored  a 
foreign  artiste  with  the  most  vibrating,  the 
most  enthusiastic,  the  most  poignant  manifes- 
tation that  it  is  possible  to  witness." 

Duse  played  for  them  Cavalleria  Rusticana, 
the  last  act  of  La  Dame  aux  Camelias,  and  the 
second  act  of  La  Femme  de  Claude.  Never 
had  she  acted  better.  When  the  curtain  fell 
"the  whole  audience  rose  to  its  feet,  bravas  and 
vivats  thundered  through  the  house,  handker- 


ELEONORA  DUSE  193 

chiefs  and  hats  were  waving,  flowers  flew  from 
boxes, — ' Au  revoir!  Au  revoir!  Au  revoir!' 
— and  ten  times  the  curtain  had  to  be  raised 
before  the  smiling  actress,  who  did  not  attempt 
to  conceal  her  joy.  Then  the  stage  was  imme- 
diately invaded  by  the  crowd.  Some  wished 
only  to  see  her  once  again ;  some  must  embrace 
her ;  others  asked  for  a  flower  from  the  bunch 
she  held  in  her  hand.  During  one  whole  hour 
the  procession  did  not  cease.  I  saw  there 
young  actresses  and  rising  actors,  with  tears  in 
their  eyes,  not  daring  to  approach  her.  Coque- 
lin  wishes  to  act  with  her  just  once  and 
begs  her  to  play  in  French.  .  .  .  Mme.  Laurent 
comes  also,  and  slowly,  with  sober  words,  ex- 
presses her  admiration.  The  Ambassador  of 
Italy  and  his  wife  arrive  in  their  turn,  and  con- 
gratulate her  with  happy  faces.  And  her 
troupe,  who  leave  to-day  for  Italy,  wait  to  say 
good-by.  .  .  .  She  kisses  them,  much  moved." 
Next  day  Duse  was  feted  by  the  Comedie  Fran>- 
gaise.  What  a  change  was  this  in  a  few  short 
weeks!  The  ending  was  a  fine  outburst,  of  a 
sort  possible  only  to  the  Latin  races,  and  it 
marked  the  very  zenith  of  Duse's  career. 

Such  was  Duse's  progress  from  a  poverty- 
stricken,  obscure  childhood  to  a  place,  at  the 
age  of  thirty-eight,  equal,  to  say  the  least,  that 
of  any  actress  of  her  day. 

Duse  could  not  fail  to  find  deep  satisfaction 
in  her  progress  from  triumph  to  triumph.  But 
in  her  case  one  feels  that  biographical  detail, 
the  accidents  of  place  and  date,  matter  com- 


194      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

paratively  little.  She  was  a  curiously  de- 
tached spirit.  "If  I  had  my  will/'  she  once 
told  Arthur  Symons,  "I  would  live  in  a  ship  in 
the  sea,  and  never  come  nearer  to  humanity 
than  that."  As  it  was,  she  lived  only  in  the 
realm  of  her  art.  She  was  of  infinite  natural 
dignity,  a  shy,  proud  woman,  always  far  re- 
moved from  the  petty  publicities  of  theatrical 
life,  like  some  patrician  living  her  isolated  life 
on  a  country  estate.  An  utter  simplicity  and 
sincerity,  the  fruits  of  a  fine  nature  and  of  1 1  the 
slings  and  arrows  of  outrageous  fortune/'  at- 
tended her  always.17  Her  face,  pale  and  typi- 

17  In  1898  Mme.  Vivanti  Chartres,  one  of  Duse's  few  inti- 
mate friends,  said  (in  the  New  York  Dramatic  Mirror)  : 
"Duse's  hatred  of  publicity  and  newspaper  interviews  has  as- 
sumed the  proportions  of  a  mania.  .  .  .  When  we  were  alone 
together,  talking  of  the  play  I  was  writing  for  her,  or  dis- 
cussing modern  art,  her  youthful  struggles  with  poverty,  or 
the  world  weariness  that  came  to  her  finally  with  her  splendid 
success,  Duse  was  herself — impulsive,  eager,  passionate, 
tender,  sad.  But  the  mere  announcement  of  a  visitor  would 
freeze  her  into  silent  hauteur. 

"I  stayed  with  her  in  Turin  for  some  time.  We  used  to  go 
out  driving  in  the  Valentino  every  morning,  for  Duse  said 
she  needed  to  begin  the  day  by  looking  at  'green  things.'  She 
was  crowding  the  Teatro  Carignano,  the  receipts  averaging 
10,000  francs  for  each  performance — a  stupendous  sum  for 
Italy.  Yes,  Duse  certainly  makes  a  great  deal  of  money, 
but  she  spends  all  that  she  makes.  She  is  exceedingly  gener- 
ous. One  day  she  gave  a  magnificent  diamond  ring  to  a 
dressmaker  whom  Worth  had  sent  to  her  from  Paris  with 
her  Dame  aux  Camtilias  dresses.  And  she  pays  her  entire 
company  all  the  year  round,  although  during  the  last  eighteen 
months  she  has  given  only  twenty-two  performances. 

"At  Monte  Carlo  we  stayed  at  the  Victoria,  the  dullest  if 
most  aristocratic  hotel  in  the  place.  But  Duse  has  a  taste 
for  the  dismal  and  the  melancholy.  She  is  very  sad — the 
saddest  woman  I  have  ever  known.  She  cannot  even  bear 


ELEONORA  DUSE  195 

cally  Italian,  at  once  sad  and  ardent,  is  the 
face  of  a  woman  who  has  thoroughly  lived,  but 
whose  soul  is  equal  to  great  trials.  Her  health 
was  never  robust,18  and  bodily  weakness  has 
often  interrupted  her  work.  Her  voice  was 
sad,  her  habit  silence,  though  on  rare  occasions 
she  is  said  to  talk  merrily.  Although  Duse  as 
an  actress  and  as  a  woman  gives  the  impression 
of  an  all-pervading  sadness,  of  a  profound 
thoughtfulness,  "the  thoughtfulness  of  one  who 
comes  toward  us  from  a  sanctuary  of  brooding 
on  life's  eternal  questions/'  the  more  amiable 
and  human  traits  are  not  wholly  lacking  in  her. 
She  is  said  to  be  quick  to  grasp  a  joke  and  to 
be  fond  of  humorous  books.  She  is  extrava- 
gant in  her  delight  in  flowers.  At  her  country 
place  in  Tuscany  she  has  literally  thousands  of 
rose  bushes. 

people's  voices.  After  the  strain  of  her  performance  she 
drives  home  quite  alone,  and  sits  down  to  her  supper  in  soli- 
tude and  silence.  During  the  days  that  I  was  with  her  we 
used  to  sit  at  opposite  ends  of  the  large  table,  sometimes  with- 
out exchanging  half  a  dozen  words,  and  she  used  to  laugh 
her  approval  across  to  me  when  I  absolutely  refused  to  answer 
her  if  she  made  any  attempts  at  polite  conversation. 

"Duse  chez  elle  dresses  almost  always  in  white  satin.  Her 
gowns  are  loose  and  limp,  and  folded  carelessly  around  her. 
.  .  .  She  is  a  charming  woman,  highly  cultured,  sincere,  brave 
and  good.  Her  conversation,  when  she  chooses  to  speak,  is 
startlingly  brilliant." 

18  It  was  her  rule  not  to  play  more  than  four  performances 
a  week.  When  she  was  in  her  thirties,  the  world  was  told 
that  she  was  a  sufferer  from  "pulmonary  phthisis,"  and  that 
her  impending  doom  was  one  of  the  causes  of  her  seclusion 
and  sadness.  All  through  her  career  there  were  periodic  re- 
ports of  her  illness,  of  canceled  engagements  and  interrupted 
tours. 


196      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Of  only  medium  height,  she  somehow  on  the 
stage  suggested  tallness.  Her  hair  was  once 
of  typical  Italian  jet-blackness,  but  long  ago 
it  turned  quite  white,  and  she  was  forced  on 
the  stage  to  wear  wigs;  off  the  stage,  she  is 
said  to  have  taken  pride  in  her  white  hair.  For 
many  years  she  appeared  on  the  stage  without 
66  make-up "  of  any  kind,  but  after  about  1900 
she  found  it  necessary  as  a  means  to  the  ap- 
pearance of  youth.  Among  the  Italians  she 
was  known  as  "dalle  belle  mani,"  for  her 
hands  were,  perhaps,  her  chief  beauty,  small 
and  beautifully  wrought;  and  like  the  Italian 
she  was,  she  used  them  expressively  and  grace- 
fully. Her  reticent  nature  showed  itself  in  her 
personal  tastes.  Off  stage  and  on  she  dressed 
with  great  simplicity,  and  she  disliked  jew- 
elry.19 

She  became  a  great  reader,  and  though  she 
never  acquired  English,  Shakespeare  was  one 
of  her  enthusiasms.  Maeterlinck  was  another. 
Cryptic  sciences  fascinated  her.  In  modern 
art,  her  sympathies  were  with  the  symbolists 
and  impressionists.  It  was  not  strange  that 

i»  "She  spends  enormous  sums  on  books  and  photographs, 
on  bonbons  and  scissors — a  curious  hobby  of  hers,  as  she  buys 
pair  after  pair,  which  she  afterwards  loses.  .  .  .  Another  of 
her  fads,  which  in  Italy  is  a  decided  novelty,  is  hygiene ;  for  to 
the  average  Italian  mind,  the  simplest  rules  of  health  and 
sanitation,  even  the  combination  of  warmth  and  good  ventila- 
tion, are  mysteries,  to  inquire  into  which  would  be  useless  and 
ridiculous.  That  Duse  should  like  to  have  a  fire  and  to  sit 
with  the  window  open  at  the  sa'me  time,  quite  passes  their 
powers  of  comprehension."  Helen  Zimmern  in  Fortnightly 
Review,  1900. 


ELEONORA  DUSE  197 

d'Annunzio,  tlie  poet-dramatist-novelist  who 
was  making  his  presence  felt  in  Italy  about  the 
time  of  her  Paris  triumph,  should  appeal  to  her 
as  a  kindred  spirit.  His  fiery  exaltation  of 
human  passions,  his  undoubted  poetic  gifts,  she 
took  for  real  genius,  and  about  1900  the  world 
heard  that  Duse  had  forsworn  all  dramatists 
else  and  would  act  henceforth  nothing  but 
d'Annunzio's  plays.  The  poet  and  the  actress 
formed  an  association  that  was  plainly  more 
than  that  of  friendship  or  professional  cooper- 
ation. That  she  was  passionately  devoted  to 
d'Annunzio  for  some  years,  and  that  their 
friendship  was  broken  by  the  publication  of  one 
of  his  novels — in  which  he  made  literary  use 
of  what  she  considered  their  sacred  alliance — 
was  the  talk  of  Europe.  The  resulting  separa- 
tion she  is  said  to  have  taken,  as  she  had  her 
earlier  love  affair,  with  tragic  seriousness. 
How  much  her  retirement  from  the  stage  was 
due  to  this  disappointment,  and  how  much 
merely  to  advancing  age,  it  is  difficult  to  say. 

The  d'Annunzio  campaign  was  not  a  success, 
even  in  Italy.  His  plays  were  not  saved  by 
patriotic  interest  in  the  author  or  by  affection 
for  the  actress  from  being  thought  decadent 
and  undramatic,  though  everywhere  the  rich- 
ness of  their  poetic  strain  was  recognized. 
Duse's  faith  however,  until  the  rupture  with 
d'Annunzio,  was  unreasoning  and  unswerving. 
She  came  to  the  United  States  again  in  1902, 
acting  in  his  plays.20  She  did  nothing  with  them 

20  Her    d'Annunzio    parts,    extending    from    1897    to    1902, 


198      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

to  add  to  the  fame  she  had  earlier  acquired, 
though,  in  spite  of  d'Annunzio,  her  acting  still 
retained  its  freedom  from  artificiality  or  ex- 
aggeration.21 

After  her  return  to  Europe  her  appearances 
became  more  infrequent.  In  1904  she  gave  a 
"command  performance"  at  the  English 
court  (she  had  always  been  popular  in  Eng- 
land, which  received  comparatively  well  even 
the  d'Annunzio  plays),  and  in  1906  she  came 
all  the  way  from  Italy  to  assist  in  the  great 
testimonial  to  Ellen  Terry.  Illness,  which  as- 
sailed her  often,  and  weariness  of  he^r  work, 
herself  and  all  things  else,  kept  her  from  the 
stage  most  of  the  time.  She  continued,  how- 
ever, to  keep  her  company  constantly  under  sal- 
ary and  at  her  command,  and  as  late  as  1909 
it  was  her  custom,  when  at  rare  intervals  the 
spirit  moved  her,  to  assemble  them  for  brief 
appearances  in  the  European  capitals.  Of  late 
years  she  has  given  her  energy  to  the  founding 
of  a  home  for  aged  actors. 

By  means  first  of  vivid  imagining  and  then 

were:  Isabella  in  Songo  di  Mattino  di  Primavera,  Anna  in  La 
Citta  Morta,  Silvia  in  La  Gioconda,  Helena  in  La  Gloria,  and 
Francesca  in  Francesca  da  Rimini. 

21  "In  La  Gioconda,  the  scene  in  the  studio,  when  the  wife, 
burdened  with  a  sense  of  intolerable  worry,  finds  herself  face 
to  face  with  the  woman  who  has  supplanted  her — would  to 
a  second  rate  actress  prove  an  irresistible  temptation  to 
frenzied  rant;  but  Duse  plays  it  with  a  sustained  intensity 
of  controlled  detestation  and  scorn  which  was  infinitely  more 
impressive,  more  artistic  and  more  true.  In  the  horrible 
climax  she  leaves  details  of  her  destroyed  hand  to  the  imag- 
ination." The  Critic. 


ELEONORA  DUSE  199 

by  the  revealing  power  of  an  unobtrusive,  lucid 
art  Duse  made  herself  the  greatest  artiste  of 
her  day.  When  the  French  said  she  had  wi- 
dened the  horizon  of  her  art  they  paid  tribute 
to  what  was,  after  all,  something  akin  to  origi- 
nal genius. 

"The  furthest  extremes  of  Duse's  range  as 
an  artist,"  wrote  Bernard  Shaw,  who  is  only 
one  of  the  critics  to  give  her  the  foremost  place 
among  modern  actresses,  "must  always  remain 
a  secret  between  herself  and  a  few  fine  ob- 
servers. I  should  say  without  qualification  that 
it  is  the  best  modern  acting  I  have  ever  seen. 
.  .  .  Duse  is  the  first  actress  whom  we  have  seen 
applying  the  method  of  the  great  school  to  char- 
acteristically modern  parts  or  to  character- 
istically modern  conceptions  of  old  parts.  .  .  . 
In  Duse  you  necessarily  get  the  great  school  in 
its  perfect  integrity,  because  Duse  without  her 
genius  would  be  a  plain  little  woman  of  no  use 
to  any  manager.  .  .  .  Duse,  with  her  genius,  is 
so  fascinating  that  it  is  positively  difficult  to 
attend  to  the  play,  instead  of  attending  wholly 
to  her.  .  .  .  Sarah  Bernhardt  has  nothing  but 
her  own  charm.  .  .  .  Duse 's  own  private  charm 
has  not  yet  been  given  to  the  public.  She  gives 
you  Cesarine's  charm,  Marguerite  Gauthier's 
charm,  the  charm  of  La  Locandiera,  the  charm, 
in  short,  belonging  to  the  character  she  imper- 
sonates; and  you  are  enthralled  by  its  reality 
and  delighted  by  the  magical  skill  of  the  artist 
without  for  a  moment  feeling  any  complicity 
either  on  your  own  part  or  on  hers  in  the  pas- 


200      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

sion  represented. "  Shaw  did  not  hesitate  to 
enter  into  the  once  popular  game  of  comparing 
Berrihardt  and  Duse,  and  in  his  estimate 
Madame  Sarah  is  indeed  a  bad  second.  "The 
French  artist's  stock  of  attitudes  and  facial  ef- 
fects could  be  catalogued  as  easily  as  her  stock 
of  dramatic  ideas :  the  counting  would  hardly  go 
beyond  the  fingers  of  both  hands.  Duse  pro- 
duces the  illusion  of  being  infinite  in  variety  of 
beautiful  pose  and  motion.  Every  idea,  every 
shade  of  thought  and  mood,  expresses  itself  deli- 
cately but  vividly  to  the  eye.  .  .  .  When  it  is 
remembered  that  the  majority  of  tragic  actors 
excel  only  in  explosions  of  those  passions  which 
are  common  to  man  and  brute,  there  will  be  no 
difficulty  in  understanding  the  indescribable  dis- 
tinction which  Duse's  acting  acquires  from  the 
fact  that  behind  every  stroke  of  it  is  a  distinc- 
tively human  idea." 

Duse  even  in  her  early  career,  when  she  was 
but  little  more  than  twenty,  had  already  broken 
with  dramatic  traditions.22  There  was  a  fairly 
definite  Italian  tradition  which  had  been  made 
familiar  by  Eistori  and  which  had  been  fos- 
tered by  Salvini.  If  Duse  had  been  French  in- 
stead of  Italian  and  if  she  had  undergone  the 

22  "Her  method  does  not  admit  even  the  possibility  of  pose. 
In  the  quietest  and  most  delicate  of  her  scenes  Bernhardt 
always  bears  traces  of  her  school  and  its  traditions  of 
autorite.  Duse  on  the  other  hand,  goes  to  the  most  daring 
lengths  in  self-effacement.  Her  stillness  is  absolute. 

"Even  what  is  exaggerated  in  Italian  gesture  has  in  her  a 
sort  of  anomalous  grace,  and  preserves  the  richness  and 
geniality  of  nature."  The  Athenceum,  1885. 


ELEONORA  DUSE  201 

regular  training  of  the  Conservatoire,  she  would 
have  met  with  another  tradition,  of  which  at 
the  time  Bernhardt  was  becoming  an  efficient 
missionary,  imposing  its  standards  even  out- 
side of  France.  Duse  in  some  way  escaped  all 
traditions.  Her  training,  such  as  it  was,  had 
been  with  strolling  players  and  in  provincial 
theatres.  What  this  experience  did  succeed  in 
giving  her  was  the  habit  of  dramatic  expres- 
sion, a  habit  that,  by  the  time  she  had  arrived 
at  the  age  when  the  usual  stage-struck  girl  be- 
comes an  actress,  had  made  her  mistress  of 
self-expression,  free  from  self-consciousness. 
Added  to  this  habit  of  going  directly  to  the  ex- 
pression of  an  idea  or  emotion  there  was,  in 
Duse's  case,  besides  the  sheer  womanliness 
that  shone  through  all  her  work,  the  ardent, 
sympathetic  imagination  that  enabled  her  to 
project  herself  into  another  personality,  shar- 
ing its  emotions  and  divining  its  experiences 
and  actions.  When  these  emotions  and  these 
actions  reached  the  stage  of  expression  there 
was  no  rigid,  school-taught  method  to  hamper 
her.  An  ingrained  habit  of  expression,  cou- 
pled with  an  illuminating,  self-effacing  imagi- 
nation, formed  the  secret  of  Duse's  famed 
" naturalness."  Most  actresses  interpret  or 
" portray "  a  character;  Duse  became  the  char- 
acter itself,  transmuted  into  life  in  terms  of 
Duse's  own  mind  and  spirit,  and,  as  often  as 
not  something  finer,  more  noble,  more  sensitive, 
than  the  dramatist's  conception.  Such  a  char- 
acter, with  her,  was  "a  figure  designed  and 


202      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

modeled  beforehand,  proportioned,  poised,  and 
polished  to  the  finger  tips  with  a  sculptor's  pa- 
tient assiduity,  and  then,  by  an  ever  renewed 
miracle  endowed  with  'the  crowded  hour  of 
glorious  life'  at  the  electric  touch  of  the  artist's 
imagination."23 

23  William  Archer. 


lilk;mfi 


ADA  REHAN 


ADA  EEHAN 

AS  a  superbly  alive,  radiant  personality,  Ada 
Rehan  stands  out  in  the  memory  of  any  one 
who  has  ever  seen  her.  She  is  of  the  great  line 
of  actresses.  She  is  (or  one  should  say  was,  for 
Ada  Rehan  several  years  ago  passed  from  the 
stage)  more  nearly  a  Woffington,  a  Terry,  than 
any  actress  America  has  yet  produced.  Like 
Ellen  Terry,  she  was  a  miraculous  blend  of 
regal  force,  charm,  and  thoroughly  grounded 
ability. 

Yet  "  miraculous "  is  hardly  the  word,  for 
Ada  Rehan  labored  long  and  devotedly  for  the 
eminence  that  both  America  and  England  ac- 
corded her.  Hers  was  no  sudden  Mary- Ander- 
son-like leap  into  "stardom,"  nor  did  she  gain 
a  prominent  place  on  the  stage  with  the  com- 
parative ease  that  seems  possible  in  these  days. 
As  we  shall  see,  her  apprenticeship  was  exceed- 
ingly long  and  arduous.  In  proportion  was  her 
radiance,  when  once  she  was  placed  in  the  map 
of  "  stars, "  for  Rehan  will  be  at  least  a  tradi- 
tion, to  be  placed  with  those  of  Woffington  and 
Terry,  when  her  lesser  sisters  are  long  since 
quite  forgotten.  She  was  the  supreme  embodi- 
ment for  all  time,  one  feels  certain,  of  Kather- 
ine,  Shakespeare's  Shrew.  That  part  she  was 

203 


204      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

born  to  play.  Her  Beatrice,  her  Rosalind,  her 
Viola  were  all  memorable  impersonations;  and 
she  played  the  heroines  of  old  English  comedy 
in  a  way  that  again  recalled  the  famous  ac- 
tresses of  the  past. 

Ada  E-ehan 1  was  born  in  Limerick,  Ireland. 
The  fact  is  rich  in  significance,  for  though  she 
was  brought  to  the  United  States  while  she  was 
a  mere  child,  and  received  here  all  of  her  stage 
training,  there  is  no  denying  the  strong  Celtic 
strain  in  her,  the  Irish  buoyancy  and  geniality. 

The  family  came  to  America  in  1865,2  when 

1  The  name  was  really  Crehan.    Why  was  it  changed  ?     Per- 
haps because  in  its  original  form  it  was  too  baldly  Irish.    Yet 
Ada's  two  elder  sisters  had  taken  to  the  stage  and  both  ap- 
peared   with    the    name    O'Neill.     Her    mother    was    Harriet 
O'Neill,  her  father  William  Crehan.    There  were  six  children, 
three  boys  and  three  girls.     The  story  used  to  be  current  that 
"Crehan"  became  "Rehan"  through  an  error  of  printing;  that 
when   Ada  first  appeared   in   Philadelphia,   with   Mrs.    Drew, 
she  was  named  on  a  playbill  "Ada  C.  Rehan";  and  that,  in 
view  of  the  favorable  newspaper  notices  given  the  new  actress, 
Mrs.  Drew  advised  her  to  retain  the  name  inadvertently  given 
her, — all   interesting   surely,   and   perhaps   true.     Playbills   of 
the  Arch  Street  Theatre  (Philadelphia)  of  1874,  however,  give 
"Ada  Crehan." 

2  The  date  of  her  birth  has  always  been  given  as  April  22, 
1860.     There  are  reasons  for  thinking  it  must  have  been  earlier. 
It  would  not  be  the  only  instance  in  which  an  actress'  age  has 
been   reduced  by  a   retroactive   manipulation   of   dates.     Her 
first  appearances  on  the  stage  were  in  1873  and  1874,  and  by 
the  time  she  went  to  Daly,  in  1879,  she  had  had  an  extended 
experience  that  would  be  simply  marvelous  for  a  girl  of  nine- 
teen.    Her  hair  began  to  turn  gray  about  1894.    Mr.  Winter 
says  the  streaks  of  gray  came  prematurely.     Of  course,  they 
did,  in  any  event,  but  thirty-four  is  an  extraordinarily  early 
age  for  such  a  phenomenon  in  an  actress.    An  anecdote,  not 
worth  repeating,  in  the  Boston  Record  for  November  24,  1888, 
is  introduced  in  this  way:  "Ada  Rehan  is  forty  years  old  and 


ADA  RERAN  205 

Ada  was  about  ten,  and  settled  in  Brooklyn. 
None  of  her  family  had  ever  been  on  the  stage, 
and  she  went  to  school,  as  any  other  girl  would, 
quite  as  if  she  were  never  destined  to  be  an  ac- 
tress. The  three  Crehan  sisters  must  have 
been  a  talented,  attractive  group  of  girls,  how- 
ever, for  both  of  Ada's  elder  sisters  preceded 
her  to  the  stage,  though  neither  of  them  gained 
a  tithe  of  the  repute  that  was  to  come  to  the 
youngest  of  the  three.3  When  Ada  first  stepped 
on  a  stage,  Kate,  the  eldest,  had  been  on  the 
stage  half-a-dozen  years,  and  for  four  years  had 
been  the  wife  of  Oliver  Doud  Byron,  the  author 
and  star  of  Across  the  Continent,  a  great  pop- 
ular success  of  the  day.4  One  night,  when  the 
Byrons  were  playing  Across  the  Continent,  in 
Newark,  New  Jersey,  the  actress  who  played 
Clara,  a  small  part,  was  suddenly  taken  ill. 
Ada,  who  up  to  now  had  had  no  idea,  no  definite 

over.  She  makes  up  fairly  for  girlish  roles  .  .  .  but  at  close 
sight  in  the  cold  light  of  day  she  shows  her  age."  If  worthy 
of  any  consideration,  this  paragraph  would  place  the  birth- 
date  before  1850,  obviously  going  to  the  other  extreme.  The 
correct  date  is  undoubtedly  1855,  or  thereabout.  Thus  she 
was  about  eighteen  when,  in  1873,  she  made  her  first  appear- 
ance. 

3  The  eldest,  Kate,  "had  been  a  choir  singer  in  Limerick,  and 
while  singing  at  a  concert  one  day  in  New  York  was  heard  by 
Harvey  Dodworth  and  invited  to  join  the  chorus  for  Lester 
Wallack's  production  of  the  opera  of  Don  Ccesar  de  Bazan. 
She  accepted,  and  was  also  joined  by  her  younger  sister  Hattie, 
that  being  the  debut  of  the  Crehan  family  upon  the  stage." 

4  Arthur  Byron,  the  actor,  is  their  son.     Harriet,  the  second 
sister,  had  a  long  and  comparatively  inconspicuous  career  on 
the  stage  as  Hattie  Russell.     Two  brothers,  William  Crehan 
and  Arthur  Rehan,  were  more  or  less  definitely  identified,  after 
Ada's  success,  with  the  business  side  of  the  theatre. 


206      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

idea  at  least,  of  attempting  a  stage  career,  was 
pressed  into  service,  and  played  the  part  that 
one  night,  and  played  it  with  such  confidence  and 
success  that  a  family  council  straightway  de- 
termined her  fate  for  her.  She  was  to  go  on 
the  stage. 

This  date,  1873,  is  the  first  one  of  great  im- 
portance in  Miss  Behan's  stage  career.  The 
next  came  six  years  later  when  Augustin  Daly 
engaged  her  as  a  member  of  his  company  at 
Daly's  Theatre.  Theatre,  company,  manager 
and  "leading  woman "  there  combined  to  write 
one  of  the  most  brilliant  chapters  in  America's 
theatrical  history. 

The  record  of  those  six  early  years  after  her 
first  appearance,  and  before  she  went  to  Daly, 
is  one  of  the  most  amazing  industry  and  prog- 
ress. She  played  for  a  time  with  the  Byrons, 
and  made  while  with  them  her  first  appearance 
in  New  York  (1873)  in  a  small  part  in  The 
Thoroughbred.  Soon  she  went  to  Philadelphia 
for  her  first  regular  engagement,  as  a  member 
of  Mrs.  John  Drew's  company  at  the  Arch 
Street  Theatre.  John  Drew,  the  younger,  the 
present  actor  of  that  name,  made  his  first  ap- 
pearance at  about  the  same  time,  also  in  Mrs. 
Drew's  company.  Here  Miss  Eehan  remained 
for  two  seasons  (1873-75)  receiving  much  valu- 
able training,  though  as  yet  she  played  only 
subordinate  parts. 

Then  came  several  seasons  of  " stock" — 
"stock"  according  to  the  old-fashioned  system, 
in  which  the  * '  stars ' '  wandered  from  city  to  city, 


ADA  REHAN  207 

finding  in  each  place  a  company  ready  to  sup- 
port them  in  the  standard  plays  and  ready  to 
"get  up"  in  new  plays  at  short  notice.  As 
many  of  the  " stars"  acted  in  the  same  plays, 
the  stock  company  was  less  like  the  present  day 
organization  so  called,  which  presents  a  new 
play  each  week  and  then  drops  it  for  good,  than 
like  a  ' t  repertoire  company, ' '  with  a  number  of 
plays  always  thoroughly  at  its  command.  The 
system  made  for  thorough  training,  as  it  com- 
bined with  a  wide  range  of  material  opportuni- 
ties for  many  performances  of  any  given  play. 
The  later  Daly  company,  often  called  a  stock 
company,  was  really  such  a  repertoire  company 
save  that  it  boasted  its  own  fixed  and  brilliant 
"star,"  AdaRehan. 

After  her  two  years  with  Mrs.  John  Drew, 
Miss  Eehan  went  to  Louisville  to  join  the  stock 
company  of  Macauley's  Theatre,  where  she  re- 
mained one  season  (1875-6).  If  she  had  re- 
mained a  few  months  longer  she  would  have  as- 
sisted in  the  debut  there  of  Mary  Anderson. 

She  followed  her  year  in  Louisville  with  two 
seasons  (1876-8)  as  a  member  of  John  W.  Al- 
baugh's  company  in  Albany.5  Here  it  was,  in 
December,  1877,  while  she  was  playing  Bianca 
in  Katherine  and  Petruchio?  that  Augustin 
Daly  first  saw  her  and  observed  her  exceptional 
talent. 

At  the  end  of  her  service  with  Mr.  Albaugh 
she  was  but  twenty-three.  And  yet  she  had 

o  While  in  his  employ  she  appeared  also  in  Baltimore. 
6  Garrick's  version  of  The  Taming  of  the  Shrew. 


208      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

been  a  regularly  engaged  professional  actress 
for  five  years,  had  played  Ophelia  to  Booth's 
Hamlet  and  Lady  Anne  to  John  McCullough's 
Kichard  III,  besides  acting  at  various  times 
Cordelia  in  Lear,  Desdemona  in  Othello,  Celia 
in  As  You  Like  It,  and  Olivia  in  Twelfth 
Night,  and  had  appeared  not  only  with  Booth 
and  McCullough  but  with  Adelaide  Neilson, 
Lawrence  Barrett,  John  Brougham,  John  T. 
Kaymond,  and  many  of  the  other  " stars"  of 
the  day.7 

Next,  during  the  season  of  1878-79,  Miss 
Eehan  was  for  a  brief  period  in  the  company 
of  Fanny  Davenport.  In  the  course  of  this  en- 
gagement a  now  forgotten  play,  Pique,  was 
acted  by  Miss  Davenport,  and  Ada  Eehan  was 
given  the  part  of  Mary  Standish.  The  author 
of  the  play  was  Augustin  Daly.  When  it  was 
given  at  the  Grand  Opera  House  in  New  York, 
in  April,  1879,  Mr.  Daly  again  was  struck  by 
the  promise  of  the  young  actress  whom  he  had 
seen  as  Bianca  in  Albany  a  year  and  a  half 
before.  Immediately  he  placed  her  under  his 
management  and  gave  her  the  part  of  Big 

7  In  these  pre-Daly  days  Miss  Rehan  played,  besides  the 
Shakespearean  parts  named,  a  host  of  others  that  it  would 
be  tedious  and  useless  to  name.  Most  of  them  would  suggest 
nothing  to  a  present-day  theatregoer.  A  few  that  may  have 
some  significance  are:  Esther  Eccles  in  Caste,  Hebe  in  Pina- 
fore, Lady  Florence  in  Rosedale,  Lady  Sarah  in  Queen  Eliza- 
beth, Little  Em'ly  in  David  Copperfield,  Louise  in  Frou-Frou, 
Marie  de  Comines  in  Louis  XI,  Mary  Netley  in  Ours,  Pauline 
in  The  Lady  of  Lyons,  Queen  of  France  in  Henry  V,  Ursula 
in  Much  Ado  About  Nothing,  and  Virginia  in  Virginius. 
There  were  about  ninety  in  all. 


ADA  REHAN  209 

Clemence  in  his  own  version  of  Zola's  L'Assom- 
moir,  which  he  produced  at  the  Olympic  Theatre 
the  following  month.  It  was  a  small  part,  she 
did  it  well,  and  within  a  few  weeks  was  pro- 
moted to  the  part  of  Virginie.  In  September 
of  the  same  year  she  appeared  for  the  first  time 
on  the  stage  of  Daly's  Theatre,  which  was  built, 
oddly  enough,  on  the  site  of  Wood's  Museum,8 
where  six  years  ago  she  had  acted  her  small  part 
in  The  Thoroughbred.  It  is  worth  mentioning 
that  the  first  parts — both  in  September,  1879 — 
in  the  long  list,  literally  of  hundreds,  that  she 
was  to  act  during  her  twenty  years  with  Mr. 
Daly  were  Nelly  Beers  in  Love's  Young  Dream, 
and  Lu  Ten  Eyck  in  Divorce. 

With  Ada  Eehan  the  leading  woman  of  the 
reorganized  Daly  company  there  began  a  new 
era  in  her  career,  in  Mr.  Daly's,  and,  it  is  fair 
to  say,  in  American  acting.  Until  Mr.  Daly's 
death  in  1899  Miss  Eehan  retained  her  position, 
and  in  that  time  she  progressed  from  obscurity 
to  the  position  of  one  of  the  leading  actresses 
of  her  day,  famous  alike  in  America  and  Eng- 
land, and  famous  even  on  the  continent  of 
Europe.  With  Mr.  Daly's  death,  though  she 
continued  to  act  and  to  act  well,  there  passed 
the  period  of  her  peculiar  fame,  and  in  a  half- 
dozen  years  she  had  ceased  to  act  altogether. 

Such,  in  bald  and  brief  outline,  has  been 
Eehan 's  career.  Of  the  straggles,  the  aspira- 
tions, the  triumphs  of  an  actress,  of  her  life, 
in  short,  any  mere  record  can  tell  but  little. 

s  On  the  southwest  corner  of  Thirtieth  Street  and  Broadway. 


210      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

What  sort  of  woman  was  Ada  Behan?  Well, 
she  was  of  the  royal  line  of  women,  regal  in  her 
stature,  opulent  in  bodily  beauty,  gracious  and 
rich  in  her  nature.  Her  face,  like  her  careless 
joyousness  and  exuberant  animal  spirits,  was 
Celtic.  She  was  not  beautiful  in  the  conven- 
tional sense,  but  as  with  Ellen  Terry,  simple 
beauty  paled  beside  her.  Her  hair  was  exuber- 
ant too,  and  brown,  except  where,  in  the  middle 
of  her  career,  it  became  streaked  with  gray. 
She  had  the  gray-blue  Irish  eye.  "What  a 
great  woman  she  was ! ' '  wrote  one  of  her  more 
rhapsodic  admirers.9  "Tall,  easy,  almost  ma- 
jestic, except  that  the  geniality  of  her  manner 
took  from  majesty  its  aloofness  and  pride. 
When  she  spoke  her  voice  came  out  mellif- 
luently,  so  that  without  forcing  it  seemed  to 
pervade  the  room.  It  had  something  of  the 
quality  of  a  blackbird's  note.  Ada  Eehan  is 
not  at  all  of  a  classic  type  of  countenance.  She 
is  genuine  Celtic.  To  call  her  pretty  would  be 
ridiculous,  for  prettiness  is  something  that 
seems  to  dwindle  beside  her.  To  call  her  beau- 
tiful would  be  neither  completely  expressive  nor 
apt,  for  her  features  have  the  warp  of  too  many 
conflicting,  irrepressible  emotions,  and  the  turn 
of  what  one  feels  tempted  to  call  rale  ould  Irish 
humor.  Yet  the  eyes,  and  the  brow,  and  the 
head  are  beautiful — the  eyes  especially,  with 
their  soft,  lamp-like,  mellow  glow,  with  their 
sharp,  fiery  glints,  with  their  gorgon  directness, 
or  again  with  their  innumerable  little  twinkles 

o  Arthur  Lynch,  in  Human  Documents. 


ADA  REHAN  211 

of  fun  and  sly  melting  shadows,  with  the  flash- 
ing from  the  lids  and  the  eyelashes  of  light,  or 
the  deep,  still  beaming  that  perhaps  most  elo- 
quently of  all  speaks  of  soul."    These  are  high 
words,  indeed,  but  they  had  much  provocation. 
All  these  things,  and  more,  Kehan  appeared 
across  the  footlights.     Off  the  stage,  simply  as 
Ada  Eehan,  she  was  still  the  exceptional  woman. 
An  actress  who  is  capable  of  diverse  and  subtle 
characterizations  is  often,  singularly  enough,  in 
her  own  person  a  woman  of  essential  simplicity. 
Such  seems  to  have  been  the  case  with  Ada 
Rehan.    Her  lack  of  pose  can  be  glimpsed  in 
various  ways,  in  her  capacity  for  pleasure  in 
the  success  of  others,  her  ability  to  see  and 
admire  beauty  and  talent  in  other  women, — a 
severe  test  for  any  actress.    '  '  She  was  generous 
and  grateful,  and  she  never  forgot  a  kindness/' 
says  Mr.  Winter.    "Her  mind  was  free  from 
envy  and  bitterness  .  .  .  and  she  never  spoke 
ill  word  of  anybody. "    One  more  evidence 
>f  her  simplicity  was  her  un-Bernhardtian  sense 
)f  contentment  in  the  limited  opportunities  for 
jersonal  glorification  afforded  by  her  position 
dth  Mr.  Daly.    As  we  shall  see,  she  refused 
lumbers  of  offers  to  star,  preferring  the  com- 
)arative  obscurity  of  her  position  as  " Daly's 
leading   woman."    Notice    the    phrases    of    a 
writer  in  the  Sun,  who  observed  her  on  the 
street  in  New  York  in  1894,  after  her  return 
?rom  triumphant  appearances  in  London.    ' '  She 
exhibits  a  degree  of  calm  serenity  that  might  al- 
lost  be  called  matronly.  .  .  .  Her  face  wears  a 


212      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

youthful  and  almost  childish  expression.  .  .  . 
Much  of  her  time  has  been  spent  since  her  return 
in  looking  in  the  shop  windows,  but  apparently 
she  has  not  purchased  much,  either  here  or  in 
Europe,  as  her  attire  is  invariably  that  of  a 
woman  who  devotes  little  thought  to  dress I" 
But  this  writer  goes  on  to  say :  *  *  No  one  would 
be  likely  to  mistake  her  for  anything  but  an 
actress  nowadays.  Her  distinction  of  bearing 
is  so  great  that,  even  if  her  face  were  not  fa- 
miliar to  the  public,  a  great  many  people  would 
turn  around  to  look  at  her  a  second  time  as  she 
walks  along  the  street. " 

Her  early  education  was  inconsiderable,  and 
we  are  told  that  even  during  her  brief  career 
in  school  she  cared  less  for  her  lessons  than  for 
romping  with  her  three  brothers, — a  course  that 
may  not  have  been  without  its  value  in  prepar- 
ing her  for  her  success  as  Katherine  and  Peggy 
Thrift.  Later,  however,  she  read  much.  She 
liked  Thackeray,  and  she  particularly  admired 
Balzac.  "Her  knowledge  of  human  nature, — 
gained  partly  by  keen  intuition  and  partly  by 
close  observance, — was  ample,  various,  and 
sound,"  wrote  William  Winter,  who  knew  her 
well.  "Her  thoughts,  and  often  her  talk,  dwelt 
upon  traits  of  character,  fabrics  of  art,  and 
beauties  of  nature,  and  she  loved  rather  to  speak 
of  these  than  of  the  commonplaces  and  practi- 
cal affairs  of  the  passing  day.  Her  grasp  of 
character  was  intuitive ;  she  judged  rightly,  and 
she  was  seldom  or  never  mistaken  in  her  esti- 
mate of  individuals.  Her  perception  was  ex- 


ADA  BEHAN  213 

cecdingly  acute,  and  she  noted,  instantly  and 
correctly,  every  essential  trait,  however  slight, 
of  each  person  who  approached  her  presence. 
She  was  intrinsically  sincere,  modest,  and 
humble — neither  setting  a  great  value  on  her- 
self nor  esteeming  her  powers  and  achievements 
to  be  unusual;  she  has  been  known  to  be  in 
tears,  at  what  she  deemed  a  professional  failure, 
while  a  brilliant  throng  of  friends  was  waiting 
to  congratulate  her  on  an  unequivocal  success. M 
Here,  as  elsewhere,  Mr.  Winter  has  poured 
out  his  praise  with  a  lavish  hand.  Yet  it  is  clear 
that  Ada  Behan  added  many  fine  qualities,  for 
those  who  knew  her,  to  those  qualities  known 
to  all  who  saw  her:  vitality,  a  true  sense  of 
comedy,  personal  charm. 

For  a  long  time  newspaper  interviewers  had 
the  greatest  difficulty  in  getting  Miss  Eehan  to 
talk  for  them.    Like  Duse  and  Mrs.  Fiske,  she 
loathed   the    interview.    By   nature   she   was, 
within  the  circle  of  her  friends,  candid  and  in- 
genuous,  talking  freely,    stating  frankly   her 
)pinions  and  drawing  freely  from  a  fund  of  in- 
vesting anecdotes  about  the  personages  she 
iet  and  knew  on  both  sides  of  the  ocean.    It  is 
elated  that  during  her  first  visit  to  London, 
she   met   at   a   dinner   an   editor   with   whom 
she  talked  in  her  characteristic  manner.    He 
>rinted  all  she  said.     Though  she  was   of  a 
kindly  disposition  and  had  said  nothing  un- 
>mfortable,  she  was  annoyed  by  the  incident, 
and  for  years  avoided  journalists.10 

10  Still,  in  1888,  when  the  Daly  company  was  playing  in 


214      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Daly's  Theatre,  in  the  days  when  Ada  Eehan 
was  at  the  height  of  her  charm  and  power,  was 
sometimes  called  "the  Theatre  Frangais  of 
America."  The  leading  man  was  John  Drew 
(who  did  not  become  an  independent  "star"  un- 
til 1892) ;  the  comedian  was  James  Lewis,  a 
talented,  intelligent,  genuinely  comic  actor;11 
the  "dowager  parts"  were  played  by  the  in- 
comparable Mrs.  James  Gilbert;  and  the 
younger  women  of  the  company  were  Isabel 
Irving  and  Kitty  Cheatham,  both  clever  ac- 
tresses, though  they  paled  beside  Eehan.  At 
Daly's  one  saw  acting  that  dispelled  any  im- 
pression of  theatricalism.  Mr.  Daly's  rule  was 
rigorous,  his  standards  exacting.12  He  was  al- 

Paris,  several  of  its  members  were  interviewed,  (seemingly 
about  particularly  trivial  matters)  and  Miss  Rehan  was  one 
of  the  talkers.  She  was  said  to  have  been  pessimistic  about 
the  wisdom  of  marriages  among  actresses,  particularly  to 
actors.  This  is  an  ever  fresh  subject  for  debate.  A  writer 
in  the  New  York  Dramatic  Mirror,  September  15,  1888,  wrote 
a  column  to  refute  Miss  Rehan's  remarks. 

11  "I  would  go  to  the  theatre  any  night  if  only  to  see  him 
run  his  fingers  over  the  invisible  keys  of  the  sofa  cushion." — 
"Brunswick"  in  the  Boston  Transcript. 

12  Mary  Young,  herself  a  member  of  Daly's  Company,  in  a 
talk  to  the  Drama  League  of  Boston  in   1914,  said:     "Mr. 
Daly  was  a  most  polite  gentleman,  with  extraordinary  eyes 
of  green,  as  clear  and  sharp  as  they  were  kind  and  laughing; 
wonderful,      all-seeing     eyes!  .  .  .  The     strictest     disciplii 
reigned   everywhere.     Every   member,   with   the   exception   of 
Miss  Rehan,  seemed  to  be  in  a  state  of  complete  terror.     Mr. 
Daly   was    supreme   and   held  his    company   of   distinguished 
players   with    a   grip   of   iron.     Rules   and   regulations   were 
posted   everywhere.     One   or   two   that   I   recall   were:     "The 
way  to  succeed — mind  your  own  business/  and  'How  to 
happy — keep  your  mouth  shut.'    I  was  amazed  to  see  some 
of  the  extra  girls  hide  behind  pieces  of  scenery  rather  than 


ADA  EEHAN  215 

together  an  exceptional  manager,  scholarly  and 
thorough ;  and  his  instructions  and  advice  were 
of  immense  benefit  to  the  actors  in  his  com- 
pany,— a  fact  that  Ada  Rehan  always  freely  ac- 
knowledged. 

The  list  of  parts  that  Miss  Rehan  in  the 
twenty  years  between  1879  and  1899  acted  in 
Mr.  Daly's  company  is  simply  amazing  in  its 
extent  and  range.  We  think  of  her  as  Kather- 
ine,  as  Viola,  Bosalind  or  Beatrice,  but  she  had 
been  with  Mr.  Daly  several  years  before  the 
company  attempted  Shakespeare.  Before, 
there  had  been  a  long  succession  of  plays  whose 

face  those  remarkable  eyes  that  might  be  cast  their  way  as 
Mr.  Daly  was  casually  passing  from  one  part  of  the  stage  to 
another.  .  .  .  However,  to  my  mind  he  was  a  just  man,  al- 
though his  temper  often  caused  him  to  seem  to  do  unjust 
things.  .  .  .  His  heart  was  kind  and  he  could  not  treasure  up 
a  wrong  against  any  one  who  had  once  gained  his  confidence 
and  respect." 

C.  M.  S.  McLellan,  who  nowadays  writes  "books"  for 
operettas,  (and  who  wrote  Leah  Kleschna  for  Mrs.  Fiske)  in 
1888  was  writing  for  the  New  York  Press  what  passed  for 
amusing  comment  on  theatrical  matters.  His  chatter  about 
Mr.  Daly  and  Miss  Rehan  does  a  little  toward  characterizing 
both:  "At  the  stage  door  you  find  a  bulldog.  Mr.  Daly  se- 
cluded himself  in  a  padded  room  at  the  end  of  a  secret  passage. 
He  comes  down  to  the  dog  kennel  to  freeze  all  reporters. 
Editors  are  invited  up  to  the  green  room.  Henry  Irving  is 
supposed  to  be  the  only  man  who  ever  penetrated  to  the  padded 
chamber,  and  he  tells  the  story  that  while  he  was  there  Mr. 
Daly  opened  a  bottle  of  claret  and  smiled.  The  claret  part  of 
the  story  is  generally  credited,  but  unless  Mr.  Irving  is  de- 
generating in  his  choice  of  words  we  think  there  was  some 
mistake  about  the  smile. 

"But  if  any  of  us  ever  had  doubts  concerning  the  healthfully 
hilarious  influence  exerted  by  Mr.  Daly's  benignity  upon  a 
great  comedy  company  we  have  only  to  glance  at  Miss  Rehan 
and  be  converted.  We  have  had  that  baby  pout  of  hers  in 


216       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

names  mean  nothing  to  us  nowadays.  Many  of 
them  were  adaptations,  made  by  the  versatile 
Mr.  Daly  himself,  from  the  German.  Adapta- 
tions from  the  French,  the  American,  and  Eng- 
lish stage  had  seen  in  plenty;  but  the  German 
comedies  afforded  Mr.  Daly  a  comparatively 
unworked  field  of  which  he  made  the  most. 
One  gets  a  satisfying  sense  of  the  essential  im- 
provement since  1890  in  the  art  of  playwriting 
in  America  upon  reflecting  that  these  transla- 
tions and  rearrangements  of  pieces  grown  on  a 
foreign  soil  would  seem,  if  presented  in  our 
theatres  today,  peculiarly  thin  and  artificial. 
Miss  Behan's  more  discerning  admirers  re- 
gretted the  waste  of  her  great  talent  in  them, 
but  then,  as  now,  the  theatre  had  to  be  made  a 
paying  institution  in  order  to  exist  at  all,  and 
these  plays  indubitably  succeeded.  The  fin- 
ished acting  of  the  Daly  company,  admirable 
both  in  individual  impersonation  and  in  en- 

opera  and  in  Shakespeare,  that  imperious,  uplifted  nose  of 
hers  in  Jenny  O'Jones  and  Helena,  and  as  the  snows  of 
various  cycles  descend  on  the  heads  of  her  worshipers  the 
musical  purr  of  the  Rehan  still  sings  the  third  sweet  song 
of  seven.  And  when  she  smiles,  the  light  of  pearls  and 
rubies  creeps  out  and  illumines  the  nooks  that  the  calcium 
cannot  penetrate. 

"So  why  should  not  Mr.  Daly  live  in  a  padded  room  and 
manage  the  electric  buttons  that  blush  all  this  youth  and  di- 
vine color  across  a  befogged  community?  He  is  entitled  to 
padded  rooms,  bulldogs  and  cold  hands.  If  he  does  nothing 
for  the  next  forty  years  but  keep  the  crack  of  doom  out  of 
Rehan's  purr  he  will  have  earned  the  right  to  be  made  Sheriff 
of  New  York  County." 


ADA  REHAN  217 

semble,  made  them  one  of  the  keenest  of  the 
theatrical  pleasures  of  the  day.13 

Miss  Rehan  did  not  at  once  leap  into  recogni- 
tion as  the  leading  American  actress  of  the  day. 
For  a  long  time  she  was  thought  of  merely  as 
a  prominent  member  of  an  excellent  organiza- 
tion. Gradually,  however,  by  sheer  merit,  her 
preeminence  became  evident.  With  confidence 
she  undertook  all  kinds  of  roles,  and,  in  the 

is  The  list  of  parts  played  by  Miss  Rehan  before  she  began 
the  acquirement  of  her  more  famous  repertoire  cannot,  and 
need  not,  be  made  complete  here.  Some  of  them  were:  Isa- 
belle  in  Wives;  Cherry  Monogram  in  The  Way  We  Live; 
Donna  Antonina  in  The  Royal  Middy;  Psyche  in  Cinderella 
at  School;  Muttra  in  Xanina;  Selina  in  Needles  and  Pins; 
Phronie  in  Dollars  and  Sense;  Thisbe  in  Quits;  Tekla  in  The 
Passing  Regiment;  Tony  and  Jenny  O'Jones  in  Red  Letter 
Nights;  Barbee  in  Our  English  Friend;  Aphra  in  The  Wooden 
Spoon;  Floss  in  Seven-Twenty-Eight;  Nancy  Brusher  in  Nancy 
and  Company,  and  Etna  in  The  Great  Unknown. 

The  more  important  parts  played  by  Miss  Rehan  during 
her  twenty  years  with  Mr.  Daly  were:  Baroness  Vera  in  The 
Last  Word;  Tilburina  in  The  Critic;  Oriana  in  The  Incon- 
stant; Julia  in  The  Hunchback;  Lady  Teazle  in  The  School 
for  Scandal;  Miss  Hayden  in  The  Relapse;  Pierrot;  The 
Princess  in  Love's  Labours  Lost;  Valentine  Osprey  in  The 
Railroad  of  Love;  Mrs.  Ford  in  The  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor; 
Peggy  Thrift  in  The  Country  Girl;  Odette  in  Odette;  Rose  in 
The  Prayer;  Annis  Austin  in  Love  on  Crutches;  Doris  in 
An  International  Match;  Thisbe  in  A  Night  Off-,  Dina  in  A 
Priceless  Paragon;  Mrs.  Jassamine  in  A  Test  Case;  Hippolyta 
in  She  Would  and  She  Would  Not;  Helena  in  A  Midsummer 
Night's  Dream;  Katherine  in  The  Taming  of  the  Shrew; 
Rosalind  in  As  You  Like  It;  Viola  in  Twelfth  Night;  Beatrice 
in  Much  Ado  About  Nothing;  Letitia  Hardy  in  The  Belle's 
Stratagem;  Sylvia  (and  Captain  Pinch)  in  The  Recruiting 
Officer;  Xantippe  in  La  Femme  de  Socrate;  Kate  Verity  in 
The  Squire. 


218      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

midst  of  her  work,  there  would  occasionally 
flash  forth  an  impersonation  that  would  seem, 
what  it  often  was,  acting  of  unique  quality. 

Eehan  was  essentially  a  queen  of  comedy. 
Though  she  attempted  from  time  to  time  imper- 
sonations of  a  grave  and  even  of  a  tragic  nature, 
and  by  virtue  of  sincerity  and  womanliness  gave 
them  much  appeal,  she  never  would  have  gained 
her  preeminent  position  by  such  means.  Her 
range  was  as  wide,  however,  as  the  true  mean- 
ing of  the  word  "comedy,"  and  extended  from 
the  graceful  performance  of  the  mirthful  or 
sentimental  foolery  of  Daly's  adaptations, 
through  the  satire  of  The  Critic  to  the  farcical 
comedy  of  The  Shrew,  the  tenderly  romantic 
comedy  of  As  You  Like  It  and  Twelfth  Night, 
and  the  sophisticated  "high  comedy"  of  Much 
Ado.14 

i*  "Ada  Rehan  is  of  a  superior  race  of  women.  She  can 
be  enormously  interesting  simply  standing  looking  out  of  a 
window,  her  back  to  the  audience,  immobile,  but  with  a 
'calmness'  that  sends  off  vibrations  that  stir  the  pulses  very 
curiously,  and  make  her  always  the  magnet,  the  center. 
She  pauses,  but  it  is  the  pause  of  a  fine  balance  of  strong 
feelings.  She  is  all  alive;  she  whirls  round  and  comes  into 
the  action  with  a  bold  ringing  stroke  that  has  been  adjudged 
to  perfection.  She  can  stride — not  like  a  man,  for  she  is 
always  a  fine  woman — but  like  the  daughter  of  Fingal,  the 
sister  of  Ossian.  She  can  bang  a  door  like  a  chord  of  martial 
music.  She  can  precipitate  herself  headlong  into  a  room,  and 
seizing  her  opponent  or  her  lover,  for  she  is  equal  to  all  oc- 
casions, at  the  critical  wavering  movement,  sweep  in  with 
a  wrestler's  power  and  lift  him  metaphorically  helpless  off 
his  feet.  Yet  in  all  these  displays  Rehan  is  never  violent  in 
a  narrow  way,  or  streaky,  or  hard,  or  wiry.  .  .  .  The  beauty 
of  repose  is  delightful  in  her,  the  calm  musing  meditation, 
and  the  deep  harmonious  passion  of  devotion;  so  also  is  the 


ADA  KEHAN  219 

It  is  difficult  for  one  who  has  seen  her  in  the 
part  to  think  of  Shakespeare's  Katherine,  in 
The  Taming  of  the  Shrew,  without  at  once 
thinking  of  Ada  Rehan.  The  pride,  the  maj- 
esty, the  complete  identification  with  the  vary- 
ing moods  of  the  character,  and  the  humanity 
she  gave  to  what  can  easily  be  made  merely  a 
stage  figure,  were  quite  irresistible.  Perhaps 
she  succeeded  so  well  in  this  part  because  it  was 
in  many  ways  a  reflection  of  her  own  personal- 
ity.15 

Her  Rosalind,  by  all  accounts,  was  probably 
the  best,  possibly  excepting  Adelaide  Neilson's, 
that  the  American  stage  has  seen;  her  Viola 
"manifested  a  poetic  actress  of  the  first  order." 
Add  to  these  her  Beatrice,  her  Mrs.  Ford,  her 
Helena,  her  Portia,  not  to  speak  of  the  half 
dozen  heroines  of  Shakespeare  she  played  be- 
fore she  joined  Daly's  company,  and  you  have 
a  well  rounded  accomplishment  as  a  Shake- 
spearean actress,  which,  if  she  had  done  noth- 
ing else,  would  have  won  her  fame. 

And  she  did  much  else.    One  of  Mr.  Daly's 

quick  salient  swerve  of  emotion  wherein  the  soul  is  suddenly 
shaken  to  its  depths  by  love,  by  fear,  by  admiration  .  .  .  we 
find  life  and  flesh  and  blood  throughout,  and  everywhere  the 
fire  of  the  soul  that  animates  it."  Arthur  Lynch,  in  Human 
Documents,  London,  1896. 

15  "Playing  Katherine  brought  me  much  satisfaction,  but  a 
very  bad  reputation  for  temper,"  she  once  said.  "I  have  often 
been  amused  at  seeing  the  effect  that  a  first  performance  of 
the  'Shrew'  in  a  strange  place  produced  on  the  employers  of 
the  stage.  They  shunned  me  as  something  actually  to  be 
feared.  During  a  long  run  I  have  heard  it  said  that  I  hated 
my  Petruchio.  I  looked  upon  this  as  a  compliment." 


220      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

noteworthy  departures  from  the  ordinary 
theatrical  routine  was  his  revival  of  various 
specimens  of  old  English  comedy:  The  Coun- 
try Wife  (in  Garrick's  version  called  The  Coun- 
try Girl),  The  Inconstant,  She  Would  and  She 
Would  Not,  The  Recruiting  Officer  were  all 
Restoration  comedies,  modified  by  Mr.  Daly  to 
suit  modern  taste ;  and  The  Critic  was  his  one- 
act  rearrangement  of  Sheridan's  famous  three- 
act  satire  of  that  name.  These  pieces  all  in- 
volved difficult  tasks  for  a  modern  actress,  for 
their  language  is  of  another  time,  their  feelings 
of  a  different  civilization.  The  plays  are  never 
professionally  revived  nowadays;  and  Mr. 
Daly's  ventures  with  them  succeeded  mainly 
through  the  conspicuous  ability  of  Miss  Behan 
to  give  her  characters,  whatever  their  dress  or 
speech,  naturalness  and  vitality. 

There  was  some  surprise  when  Mr.  Daly  pro- 
duced Coppee's  The  Prayer,  for  the  usually 
buoyant  Eehan  had  now  to  portray  a  thoroughly 
serious  character.  Yet,  says  Mr.  Winter : 16 
"No  one  acquainted  with  her  nature  was  sur- 
prised at  the  elemental  passion,  the  pathos,  and 
the  almost  tragic  power  with  which  she  ex- 
pressed a  devoted  woman's  experience  of  afflic- 
tion, misery,  fierce  resentment,  self-conquest, 
self-abnegation,  forgiveness  and  fortitude. 
She  did  not  then,  nor  at  any  time,  show  herself 
to  be  a  tragic  actress,  but  she  evinced  great 
force  and  deep  feeling." 

1°  For  an  enlightening  exposition  of  Miss  Rehan's  acting 
in  her  various  roles  see  his  The  Wallet  of  Time,  Vol.  II. 


ADA  RERAN  221 

It  further  strengthens  one's  impression  of 
Miss  Eehan 's  really  triumphant  versatility  to 
read  the  records  of  her  Lady  Teazle,  which 
subtly  suggested  the  country  girl  within  the 
fine  lady;  of  her  Letitia  Hardy  with  "its  in- 
trinsic loftiness  of  woman's  spirit ";  of  her 
Jenny  0'  Jones,  an  irresistibly  comic  figure  done 
in  the  spirit  of  frank  farce;  or  of  any  of  her 
half  hundred  impersonations  in  modern  comedy, 
on  which  she  lavished  the  spirit,  the  beauty,  the 
technical  proficiency  that  were  always  in  evi- 
dence, whether  or  not  the  material  she  worked 
with  was  wholly  deserving  of  her  gifts.  She 
was  always  ambitious,  always  a  patient  hard 
worker,  and  she  never  slighted  her  tasks. 

In  1884,  when  Miss  Eehan  and  the  reorgan- 
ized Daly  company  had  been  working  together 
for  five  years,  they  made  their  first  visit  to 
London,  where  they  played  a  six  weeks'  sum- 
mer season  at  Toole's  Theatre.  London  did 
not  take  kindly  either  to  Mr.  Daly's  pieces  from 
the  German,  which  then  formed  their  repertoire, 
or  to  Miss  Eehan  herself,  whose  style  of  acting 
was  a  surprise  to  conservative  eyes.  William 
Archer  wrote  in  The  World:  "The  style  of 
Miss  Ada  Eehan  is  too  crude  and  bouncing  to 
be  entirely  satisfactory  to  an  English  audience. 
She  makes  Flos  a  painfully  ill-bred^young  per- 
son,— surely  not  a  fair  type  of  the  American 
girl ;  and  her  way  of  emphasizing  her  remarks 
by  making  eyes  over  the  footlights  is  certainly 
not  good  comedy." 17  Clement  Scott,  on  the 

17  On  a  later  visit  of  the  Daly  company  to  London,  Mr. 


222       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

other  hand,  praised  her.  No  great  impression 
was  made,  on  the  whole,  but  two  years  later, 
(1886)  when  Mr.  Daly  again  took  his  company 
to  London,  Miss  Eehan  really  made  a  name  for 
herself,  although  the  plays  were  as  yet  what 
seem  to  us  now  paltry  pieces  for  such  an  ac- 
tress :  A  Night  off,  and  Nancy  and  Company. 
At  this  time  Mr.  Daly  offered  his  company  in 
the  English  provincial  cities  and  even  ventured 
to  present  them  in  Hamburg,  Berlin  and  Paris, 
where  they  met  some  success. 

Mr.  Daly  continued  his  biennial  visit  to  Lon- 
don. In  1888,  after  the  failure  there  of  The 
Railroad  of  Love,18  he  offered  London  its  first 
glimpse  of  Eehan 's  Katherine  the  Shrew.  The 
immediate  result  was  a  grand  chorus  of  critical 
praise,  and  a  remarkable  exhibition  of  public 
interest.  If  on  her  first  entrance  ' i  she  '  took  the 
stage'  in  a  manner  that  astonished  even  the  old- 
est playgoer,"  and  if,  as  one  paper  said, 
*  Catherines  had  been  seen  before,  but  never 
such  a  Katherine  as  this,"  it  is  true  that  the 

Archer  chewed  and  swallowed  these  words,  thus :  "  'Crude 
and  bouncing/  Ye  gods!  this  of  the  swan-like  Valentine  Os- 
prey  of  The  Railroad  of  Love  and  the  divine  Katherine  of 
The  Taming  of  the  Shrew!  True,  it  is  six  years  since  these 
lines  were  written,  and  Miss  Rehan's  art  may — nay,  must — 
have  ripened  in  the  interval.  I  try  to  persuade  myself  that 
I  may  not  have  been  so  far  wrong  after  all,  but  it  won't  do. 
.  .  .  There  must  have  been  beauties  in  the  performance  of  six 
years  ago  to  which  I  was  inexcusably  blind." 

is  In  spite  of  Clement  Scott's  praise :  "Acting  of  this  kind, 
so  beneath  the  surface,  so  distinctly  opposed  to  the  common- 
place, and  so  eloquent  with  finest  touches  of  woman's  nature, 
wt  do  not  believe  has  been  seen  since  the  death  of  Aim6e 
Desclee." 


ADA  EEIIAN  223 

actress  herself  also  "took  the  stage "  in  popu- 
lar fancy.  Kehan  at  home  was  something  of  a 
recluse,  but  now  in  London  she  allowed  "so- 
ciety" to  pay  her  its  tribute  in  its  own  way. 
She  was  feted,  and  dined,  and  given  a  public 
reception.  Different  this  from  her  habits  in 
New  York,  where  reading,  and  walks  with  her 
dogs,  made  up  the  sum  of  her  leisurely  activity. 
During  the  1888  tour  Miss  Eehan  played 
Katherine  at  Stratford-on-Avon  (where  her 
portrait  in  that  role  was  hung  in  the  Shake- 
speare Memorial  Theatre),  and  in  Paris,  where 
Victorien  Sardou  assisted  in  her  "great 
triumph. ' ' 

After  another  two  years,  in  June,  1890,  the 
company  again  appeared  in  London,  and  this 
time,  in  the  estimation  of  the  critics,  her  Eos- 
alind — "a  Eosalind  who  is  a  very  woman,  and 
never  an  actress!" — surpassed  even  her  Kath- 
erine. 

From  now  on  the  trips  to  London  became 
more  frequent  and  it  soon  became  part  of  Mr. 
Daly's  programme  to  complete  each  season 
with  a  few  months  in  the  English  capital.  He 
built  there  his  own  theatre,  and  it  was  Ada 
Eehan  who  laid  its  corner-stone.19  She  visited 
Tennyson,  who  read  to  her  his  play  The  For- 
esters, which  Daly  later  produced  with  Miss 
Eehan  as  Marian  Lea. 

In  June,  1893,  the  new  Daly's  Theatre  was 
completed,  and  the  company  deserted  America 
for  more  than  a  year  to  go  to  London  to  es- 

10  October  30,   1891. 


224      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

tablish  the  success  of  the  new  house.  It  was 
dedicated  by  Miss  Rehan's  performance  of  the 
Shrew  on  June  27.  The  Foresters,  The  School 
for  Scandal  and  The  Country  Girl  followed, 
and  then  in  January,  1894,  she  acted  for  Lon- 
don her  Viola,  which  was  new  to  her  repertoire. 
Again  a  triumph,  for  Twelfth  Night  ran  for 
one  hundred  and  eleven  performances.  And 
again  Miss  Eehan  consented,  as  still  she  had 
never  done  in  Ntew  York,  to  indulge  in  the  life 
of  society. 

It  was  when  she  returned  this  time — after 
spending  the  summer  of  1894  wandering  about 
the  Continent — that  Miss  Eehan  became,  for 
the  first  time,  a  "star"  in  her  own  right.  Miss 
Eehan 's  loyalty  to  the  Daly  company — or  at 
least  her  steadfastness  in  refusing  to  be  weaned 
away  from  it — was  rather  remarkable.  When 
the  opportunity  was  offered  her  to  appear  as  a 
"star"  and  not  merely  as  a  member,  drawing 
a  fixed  salary,  of  Mr.  Daly's  company,  she  at 
first  refused.  Finally  she  consented  to  a  brief 
tour,  to  supplement  her  usual  work  with  Mr. 
Daly.  Again,  while  she  was  abroad  she  had 
received  an  offer  from  Possart  to  appear  with 
him  at  his  theatre  in  Munich,  another  from 
Blumenthal,  a  third  from  Sarah  Bernhardt,  and 
still  another  from  a  syndicate  in  London  to 
manage  and  head  a  company  there.  In  New 
York,  one  of  Mr.  Daly's  rival  managers  offered 
her  "backing"  as  a  "star"  to  the  extent  of 
$50,000.  Miss  Kehan  refused  all  these  offers, 
and  remained  content  as  leading  woman  of  the 


ADA  BEHAN  225 

Daly  stock  company.  Even  now  the  independ- 
ent tour  was  limited  to  ten  weeks ;  then  she  re- 
turned to  New  York  and  her  usual  duties.20 

In  1897  Mr.  Daly  sent  Miss  Behan  and  his 
company  on  another  English  tour.  Beginning 
(on  August  26)  with  a  performance  of  As  You 
Like  It,  at  Stratford-on-Avon,  on  the  sward  of 
the  Shakespeare  Memorial  (of  which  Miss 
Rehan  was  made  one  of  the  life  governors)  they 
proceeded  to  the  larger  provincial  cities,  as  far 
as  Glasgow  and  Edinburgh,  playing  The  Tam- 
ing of  the  Shrew,  As  You  Like  It,  Twelfth 
Night,  The  School  for  Scandal,  and  The  Last 
Word.  The  results  of  the  tour  were  all  Mr. 
Daly  could  have  hoped.  Miss  Eehan,  as 
Katherine,  in  particular,  swept  all  before  her. 

It  was  during  this  English  visit  that  George 
Bernard  Shaw,  then  dramatic  critic  of  the 
Saturday  Review,  wrote  that  he  never  saw  Miss 
Eehan  act  without  burning  to  present  Mr.  Au- 
gustin  Daly  with  a  delightful  villa  in  St.  Helena. 
He  thought  Mr.  Daly  was  wasting  Miss  Eehan 's 

20  She  began  her  first  "starring"  tour  at  the  Hollis  Street 
Theatre,  Boston,  (on  September  24,  1894)  where  many  in- 
teresting events  have  taken  place.  Here  Julia  Marlowe,  six 
years  before,  had  won  her  first  really  genuine  recognition. 
The  Hollis  Street  Theatre  was  first  opened  in  1885,  and  is 
still  often  referred  to  as  the  best-equipped  theatre  (on  the 
stage)  in  the  country.  It  was  built  in  the  site  of  the  old 
Hollis  Street  Church,  where  John  Pierpont,  grandfather  of 
John  Pierpont  Morgan,  and  Thomas  Starr  King  preached. 
The  walls  of  the  church  building  of  1808  were  incorporated 
in  the  theatre.  The  opening  attraction  was  The  Mikado.  In 
the  course  of  its  run  of  twenty  weeks  Richard  Mansfield  ap- 
peared as  Ko-Ko. 


226      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

rare  talent,  just  as  that  other  rare  talent,  Miss 
Terry's,  was  wasted  by  her  enmeshment  at  the 
Lyceum.  "Mr.  Daly  was  in  his  prime  an  ad- 
vanced man  relatively  to  his  own  time  and 
place,"  wrote  Mr.  Shaw.  "His  Irish- American 
Yanko-German  comedies,  as  played  by  Ada 
Eehan  and  Mrs.  Gilbert,  John  Drew,  Otis  Skin- 
ner and  the  late  James  Lewis,  turned  a  page 
in  theatrical  history  here,  and  secured  him  a 
position  in  London  that  was  never  questioned 
until  it  became  apparent  that  he  was  throwing 
away  Miss  Eehan 's  genius.  When,  after  the 
complete  discovery  of  her  gifts  by  the  London 
public,  Mr.  Daly  could  find  no  better  employ- 
ment for  her  than  in  a  revival  of  Dollars 
and  Cents,  his  annihilation  and  Miss  Eehan 's 
rescue  became  the  critic's  first  duty."  Mr. 
Shaw's  predilection  for  the  psychological,  real- 
istic modern  play  led  to  his  irritation  with  Miss 
Eehan 's  labors,  as  with  Miss  Terry's,  and  even 
to  some  doubt  as  to  whether  she  was  a  creative 
artist  or  a  mere  virtuosa,  "In  Shakespeare 
she  was  and  is  irresistible.  .  .  .  But  how  about 
Magda?"  Yet,  with  unwonted  complaisance, 
Mr.  Shaw  also  says,  "I  have  never  complained; 
the  drama  with  all  its  heroines  levelled  up  to 
a  universal  Ada  Eehan  has  seemed  no  such 
dreary  prospect  to  me ;  and  her  voice  compared 
to  Sarah  Bernhardt's  voix  d'or,  has  been  as  all 
the  sounds  of  the  woodland  to  the  clinking  of 
twenty-franc  pieces."  And  again,  "Her  treat- 
ment of  Shakespearean  verse  is  delightful  after 
the  mechanical  intoning  of  Sarah  Bernhardt. 


ADA  EEHAN  227 

She  gives  us  beauty  of  tone,  grace  of  measure, 
delicacy  of  articulation:  in  short,  all  the  tech- 
nical qualities  of  verse  music,  along  with  the 
rich  feeling  and  fine  intelligence  without  which 
those  technical  qualities  would  soon  become 
monotonous.  When  she  is  at  her  best,  the 
music  melts  in  the  caress  of  the  emotion  it  ex- 
presses, and  thus  completes  the  conditions 
necessary  for  obtaining  Shakespeare's  effects  in 
Shakespeare's  way." 

The  memorable  part  of  Ada  Rehan's  career 
was  now  about  to  close.  Before  Mr.  Daly's 
death  in  1899  she  added  to  her  long  list  of  im- 
personations Roxane  in  Cyrano  de  Bergerac, 
Portia  in  The  Merchant  of  Venice,  and  Lady 
Garnet  in  The  Great  Ruby,  but  none  of  these 
brought  her  any  added  fame.  Augustin  Daly 
died,  in  Paris,  in  June,  1899,  and  the  great  chap- 
ter in  Rehan's  life  ended.  Subsequently  she 
was  the  star  of  companies  organized  for  her  by 
new  managers,  and  in  1900  she  appeared  in  a 
new  play,  Sweet  Nell  of  Old  Drury,  in  which 
she  impersonated  one  of  her  famous  predeces- 
sors, Nell  Gwynn. 

In  the  spring  of  1901  Miss  Rehan  suddenly 
ended  her  tour  in  this  play,  and  sailed  to  Eu- 
rope, there  to  repair  her  broken  health  by  living 
for  awhile  at  her  bungalow  on  the  coast  of  the 
Irish  Sea.  She  had  been  more  or  less  ailing 
all  the  season,  and  the  loss  of  her  mother  in 
January,  1901,  added  to  her  troubles.  In 
1903-04  she  acted  with  Otis  Skinner  as  a  "  co- 
star"  in  plays  from  her  old  repertoire,  The 


228      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Taming  of  the  Shrew  and  The  Merchant  of 
Venice  among  them.  One  more  season  she 
played,  1904-05,  this  time  with  Charles  Eichman 
as  her  chief  support,  and  then,  on  May  2,  1905, 
she  appeared  on  the  stage  for  the  last  time, 
when  she  took  part  in  the  farewell  to  Modjeska 
at  the  Metropolitan  Opera  House,  New  York. 
Eehan  herself  has  never  had  such  a  testimonial, 
though  she  deserved  one  as  richly  as  the  great 
Polish  actress.  Unostentatiously  she  entered 
her  profession,  so  she  pursued  it,  and  so  she 
left  it,  slipping  out  of  public  life  so  quietly  that 
many  playgoers  were  half  consciously  expecting 
her  reappearance  years  after  she  had  quit  the 
stage  for  good.  But  she  can  have,  as  long  as 
she  lives,  the  reward  of  as  genuine  a  success  as 
can  come  to  any  actress.  And  it  is  also  not  be- 
neath notice  that  she  accumulated  a  fortune. 
Like  Lotta  Crabtree,  Ada  Eehan  took  good  care 
of  her  money.  In  1891,  when  she  had  been  in 
Mr.  Daly's  company  twelve  years,  she  was 
<  '  worth  something  like  $300,000. "  ' '  She  owns, ' ' 
says  a  contemporary  account,  "a  $30,000  house 
in  New  York,  possesses  mortgages  on  adjoining 
property,  and  holds  almost  enough  stock  in  a 
New  Jersey  railroad  to  entitle  her  to  the  posi- 
tion of  director.  She  is  not  extravagant  in  any- 
thing except  her  love  for  dogs." 

Of  dogs,  and  other  animal  pets,  she  was  fond. 
She  had  a  monkey,  which  Mr.  Winter,  with  a 
noticeable  lack  of  enthusiasm,  described  as  "an 
interesting  creature  of  its  kind";  and  she  had, 
wherever  she  traveled,  a  dog  or  two.  "I  have 


ADA  EEHAN  229 

seen  her  wandering  with  her  dog,"  says  Mr. 
Winter  "on  the  broad,  solitary  waste  of  the 
breezy  beach  that  stretches  away,  for  many  a 
sunlit  mile,  in  front  of  her  sequestered  cottage 
on  the  Cumberland  shore  of  the  Irish  Sea.  She 
was  never  so  contented,  never  so  radiant,  never 
so  much  herself,  as  in  that  beautiful  retreat. 
.  .  .  There,  encompassed  by  associations  of 
natural  beauty  and  of  historic  and  poetic  re- 
nown, and  surrounded  by  her  books,  pictures, 
relics,  music,  and  her  pets,  she  was  happy." 

Ada  Eehan  still  lives,  but,  her  work  done, 
she  remains  out  of  the  public  eye.  She  never 
appears  in  the  public  print.  She  is  not  yet  an 
old  woman,  and  has  many  years  to  enjoy  the 
memories  of  as  true  a  triumph  as  an  actress  can 
have.  For  by  her  exceptional,  regally  endowed 
equipment  and  her  devotion  to  her  art,  she  up- 
held the  gospel  of  the  actress, — poetry,  beauty, 
life. 


MAEY  ANDERSON 

THOUGH  a  stage  career  was  inevitable  for 
her,  Mary  Anderson  did  not  come  of  the- 
atrical people.  Her  father,  who  died  when  she 
was  four,  was  of  English  birth  and  Oxford  ed- 
ucation, and  as  he  was  a  personally  charming 
man  of  artistic  tastes  and  devoted  to  books  and 
the  drama,  it  was  undoubtedly  from  him  that 
she  derived  much  of  her  temperamental  equip- 
ment for  her  work.  Her  mother,  Marie  An- 
toinette Leugers,  was  a  Philadelphian  of 
German  parentage,  one  of  a  large  family  rig- 
orously trained  in  the  Catholic  faith.  Pious 
books,  and  not  plays,  formed  the  mental  food 
of  that  household,  and  the  children  were  for- 
bidden to  enter  the  theatre.  The  young 
Marie  had  been  but  little  outside  this  austere 
circle  when  she  met  and  loved  the  also  youthful 
Charles  H.  Anderson,  who  then  lived  in  New 
York.  Opposition  to  the  match  was  natural,  as 
young  Anderson  was  not  only  not  a  Catholic 
but  was  looked  on  by  Marie's  parents  as  one 
of  the  worldly.  He  seems  to  have  been  a  thor- 
oughly estimable  young  man,  however,  who  was 
merely  not  of  their  stamp.  When  the  young 
couple  were  forbidden  to  see  each  other,  it  did 
not  take  long  for  a  secret  correspondence  to 

230 


MARY  ANDERSON 


MARY  ANDERSON  231 

lead  to  an  elopement.  Anderson  was  appar- 
ently of  some  means.  He  and  his  young  wife, 
then  but  eighteen,  spent  a  leisurely  year  in  New 
York  and  Philadelphia,  and  in  1859  went  by  sea 
to  California.  In  Sacramento,  at  the  Eagle 
Hotel,  on  July  28,  1859,  was  born  their  daugh- 
ter. She  was  given  almost  her  mother's  name 
— Mary  Antoinette  Anderson.  The  young 
mother,  it  will  be  remembered,  was  of  a  Ger- 
man family.  It  is  perhaps  not  too  fanciful  to 
think  that  the  beauty  of  Mary  Anderson,  which 
was  later  the  treasured  boon  of  two  countries, 
was  in  part  noticeably  Teutonic  and  traceable 
to  her  mother.  But  this  beauty  did  not  mani- 
fest itself  at  once.  The  babe  was  red  and  ugly, 
in  the  manner  of  babes,  and  the  still  childlike 
mother  was  a  week  or  so  in  reconciling  herself 
to  her  child's  unpromising  aspect.  Then,  how- 
ever, also  as  usual,  it  was  clear  to  her  that  there 
never  was  such  another  baby. 

The  mother's  family  had  never  forgiven  her 
for  her  marriage.  When,  therefore,  her  hus- 
band was  called  to  England,  she  took  her 
year-old  Mary,  and  in  1860  moved  to  Louisville, 
Kentucky,  where  her  uncle  was  the  pastor  of  a 
suburban  German  Catholic  congregation.  This 
Pater  Anton  was  a  remarkable  man.  Born 
and  educated  in  Germany,  he  lived  in  Eome 
ten  years,  and  then  in  Texas.  Learned  and 
eloquent,  striking  in  appearance,  kind  and  sim- 
ple, he  was  a  great  favorite  with  old  and  young. 
He  was  soon  to  be  a  necessary  guardian  of  the 
little  Anderson  family,  for  Charles  Anderson, 


232      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

who  had  returned  from  England  and  was  an 
officer  in  the  Confederate  army,  died  in  1863, 
still  under  thirty.  Mary  was  not  yet  four, 
and  her  little  brother  Joseph  had  been  born 
but  a  few  months.  It  became  the  plan  of  the 
good  Pater  Anton  to  train  little  Joseph  as 
his  medical  assistant,  and  Mary  he  thought 
some  day  might  be  his  housekeeper,  his  helper 
with  the  poor,  his  assistant  with  the  choir,  and 
his  organist.  How  different  this  from  the 
career  she  was  actually  to  have ! l 

When  Mary  was  eight  her  mother  was  mar- 
ried again,  to  Dr.  Hamilton  Griffin,  who  had 
been  a  surgeon-major  in  the  Confederate  army. 
He  was  to  become,  during  Mary's  later  career, 
her  wise  guide  and  her  business  manager. 

At  the  time  of  this  marriage  Mary  was  sent 
for  the  first  time  to  school.  She  was  taken  to 
the  Convent  of  the  Ursulines,  near  Louisville. 
She  was  not  at  all  a  diligent  student.  She  de- 
veloped early  a  liking  for  music,  which  with  a 
little  German  was  about  all  she  could  bring 
herself  to  study.  It  is  clear  that,  with  a  likable 
nature  and  a  good  disposition,  she  was  still 
somewhat  of  a  problem  for  the  good  nuns  who 
were  her  teachers.  At  first  she  was  utterly 

i  Mary  Anderson  was  the  child  of  a  devout  Catholic  mother, 
her  brief  period  of  schooling  was  in  Catholic  schools,  her  be- 
loved Pater  Anton  was  of  course  a  strong  influence  for  her 
adherence  to  that  faith,  and,  throughout  her  public  life  and 
since,  her  devotion  to  her  church  has  been  constant  and 
earnest.  One  of  her  friends  (Henry  Watterson)  expressed  the 
conviction  that  to  her  religion  she  owed  much  of  the  fortitude 
that  carried  her  through  the  ordeals  and  failures  of  her  career. 


MARY  ANDERSON  233 

homesick,2  but  after  a  term  or  so  she  began  to 
like  the  convent.  Then  her  serious  sickness 
with  a  fever  kept  her  at  home,  but  after  a  year's 
rest  she  began  school  again,  this  time  at  the 
Presentation  Academy,  a  day  school.  In  read- 
ing she  stood  at  the  head  of  her  class,  but  she 
was  indifferent  to  her  other  studies  and  was 
continually  punished  for  not  knowing  her  les- 
sons. Mary  Anderson,  on  whom  thousands 
were  later  to  gaze  as  she  stood,  as  Galatea,  on 
the  statue 's  pedestal,  long  before  had  practice 
when  she  stood  in  the  corner  with  a  book  bal- 
anced on  her  head,  or  sat  on  the  dunce-stool; 
this  second  punishment  she  positively  liked  for 
she  could  "see  the  girls  better,  and  the  seat 
was  so  much  more  comfortable  than  the  hard 
benches. ' ' 

The  little  Mary  Anderson  of  that  day  was  a 
high-spirited  girl,3  keenly  intelligent  in  spite  of 

2  "The  convent  was  a  large,  Italian-looking  building,  sur- 
rounded by  gardens  and  shut  in  by  high,  prison-like  walls. 
That  first  night  in  the  long  dormitory,  with  its  rows  of 
white  beds  and  their  little  occupants,  some  as  sad  as  myself, 
my  grief  seemed  more  than  I  could  bear.  The  moon  made  a 
track  of  light  across  the  floor.  A  strain  of  soft  music  came 
in  at  the  open  window;  it  was  only  an  accordion,  played  by 
someone  sitting  outside  the  convent  wall;  but  how  sweet  and 
soothing  it  was!  The  simple  little  melody  seemed  to  say: 
'See  what  a  friend  I  can  be !  I  am  music  sent  from  heaven  to 
cheer  and  console.  Love  me,  and  I  will  soothe  and  calm  your 
heart  when  it  is  sad,  and  double  all  your  joys/  It  kept  say- 
ing such  sweet  things  to  me  that  soon  I  fell  asleep,  and 
dreamed  I  was  at  home  again.  From  that  moment  I  felt 
music  a  panacea  for  all  my  childhood's  sorrows." — Mary  An- 
derson, A.  Few  Memories. 

s  While  a  mere  girl,  Mary  learned  to  ride  a  horse.  Twice 
a  year  a  visit  was  made  to  an  Indiana  farm.  She  learned 


234      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

indolence  in  school,  who  better  than  study  liked 
acting  childish  plays  with  her  baby  sister  and 
brothers.  One  night,  when  she  was  twelve,  she 
heard  for  the  first  time  the  name  of  Shakespeare 
and  heard  Hamlet  read.  It  marked  the  begin- 
ning of  an  epoch  in  her  life.  For  days  she 
could  think  of  nothing  but  Hamlet  and  the  won- 
derful book  which  had  "suddenly  become  like 
a  casket  filled  with  jewels. ' '  A  few  nights  later 
she  entered  her  surprised  family  circle  wrapped 
in  a  cloak  and  reciting  a  garbled  version  of  one 
of  Hamlet's  speeches.  From  then  on  Shake- 
speare was  her  constant  companion  and  in- 
spiration. About  the  same  time  she  saw  her 
first  play — Richard  HI.  Impressed  and  de- 
lighted with  this  and  other  plays,  she  gradually 
became  a  less  forgetful  and  mischievous  and  a 
much  more  thoughtful  little  girl.  She  and  her 
brother  would  go  to  the  Saturday  matinees, 
arriving  hours  before  the  performance  for  the 
pleasure  of  merely  being  in  the  land  of  enchant- 
ment as  long  as  possible. 

When  Mary  was  fourteen  Edwin  Booth  came 
to  Louisville.  Here  was  a  turning  point  in  her 
life.  After  seeing  him  in  Richelieu — the  first 
great  acting  she  had  seen — she  spent  a  sleep- 
less night,  her  brain  teeming  with  her  impres- 
sions of  his  art  and  with  disturbing  thoughts 

to  ride  spirited  horses  without  saddle  or  bridle.  Riding 
was  always  her  favorite  amusement.  Long  afterwards,  in 
London,  a  riding-master  once  said  to  her:  "Why,  Miss  Han- 
derson,  you  'ave  missed  your  vocation.  What  a  hexcellent 
circus  hactor  you  would  'ave  made!  I'd  like  to  see  the  'orse 
as  could  throw  you  now." 


MARY  ANDERSON  235 

as  to  her  own  destiny.  She  then  and  there  de- 
cided on  a  stage  career,  and  resolved  to  study 
and  to  train  herself.  She  kept  her  object  a 
secret,  but  made  a  bargain  with  her  mother 
whereby  she  promised  to  study  diligently  if  al- 
lowed to  do  so  at  home,  for  school  had  become 
unendurable.  The  mother  accepted,  for  Mary 
could  at  least  do  no  worse  than  she  had  at  the 
Academy.  Now  began  a  course  of  self -instruc- 
tion in  Mary's  little  room  at  the  top  of  the 
house.  Not  only  did  she  make  better  progress 
than  ever  in  the  ordinary  branches,  but  she 
carefully  trained  her  own  voice,  worked  hard 
to  overcome  a  natural  awkwardness  by  fencing 
and  other  exercises,  and,  above  all  in  her 
own  mind,  she  memorized  parts — Eichard  III, 
Eichelieu,  Pauline  in  The  Lady  of  Lyons,  and 
the  Joan  of  Arc  of  Schiller.  One  evening  she 
astonished  her  mother  and  Dr.  Griffin  with  a 
scene  from  The  Lady  of  Lyons.  Especially 
was  her  stepfather  impressed  with  the  power 
which  Mary  had  suddenly  revealed.  At  his  so- 
licitation an  actor  from  the  local  theatre  called 
to  hear  her  read.  This  Henry  Wouds  was  in 
turn  enough  impressed  to  speak  of  the  young 
Miss  Anderson  to  Charlotte  Cushman,  in  whose 
company  he  soon  afterward  acted.  He  sent 
word  that  Miss  Cushman  would  like  to  see  the 
young  aspirant  and  hear  her  read.  So  Mrs. 
Griffin  reluctantly  allowed  herself  to  be  per- 
suaded to  -take  her  daughter  to  Cincinnati, 
where  Miss  Cushman  was  playing.  The  hear- 
ing took  place  in  the  great  actress's  hotel. 


236      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Kichelieu  and  Joan  of  Arc  were  the  parts  se- 
lected. When  the  trial  was  over,  Miss  Gush- 
man,  somewhat  to  the  mother's  dismay,  not 
only  took  Mary's  career  as  an  actress  for 
granted,  but  thought  it  possible  for  her  to  begin, 
not  as  usual  at  the  bottom  but,  with  a  little  more 
training,  in  parts  of  importance.  She  coun- 
seled a  course  of  lessons  from  George  Vanden- 
hoff,  a  veteran  New  York  teacher  of  stage 
technique. 

At  this  point  Mrs.  Griffin's  thorough  interest 
and  sympathy  were  won.  She  and  Mary  went 
to  New  York,  and  the  short  term  of  ten  lessons 
of  an  hour  each  was  undergone,  not  with  entire 
comfort  for  Mary,  for  her  teacher  found  it  con- 
stantly necessary  to  repress  her  enthusiasm  and 
crude  excess  of  vigor.  The  lessons  were  bene- 
ficial, however  (they  were  the  only  formal  train- 
ing in  stage  work  Mary  Anderson  ever  had), 
and  she  returned  to  Louisville  and  her  attic 
stage  with  unabated  ambition.  With  no  one  but 
her  mother  to  guide  her,  Mary  bent  laboriously 
to  her  task,  renouncing  all  else.  A  year  of  this, 
and  she  began  to  be  discouraged,  for  there 
seemed  to  be  no  prospects  of  actual  appearance. 
Then  John  McCullough  came  to  Louisville.  As 
one  of  the  most  distinguished  actors  of  that  day, 
his  opinion  and  approval  of  Mary  was  sought 
by  the  thoroughly  enthusiastic  Dr.  Griffin.  Mc- 
Cullough came  reluctantly  to  the  Griffin  home, 
openly  skeptical  as  to  the  beginner's  claim  to 
attention,  and  determined  to  stay  but  a  quarter 


MARY  ANDERSON  237 

of  an  hour.  He  stayed  for  several  hours,  acted 
with  Mary  scenes  from  all  the  plays  she  knew, 
called  frequently  thereafter  to  act  Shakespeare 
with  her,  and  ended  by  introducing  and  recom- 
mending her  to  Barney  Macauley,  manager  of 
the  Louisville  Theatre,  as  an  actress  of  great 
promise. 

It  was  this  manager  who  gave  Mary  her  first 
opportunity  to  appear  on  a  real  stage.  Casu- 
ally calling  with  Dr.  Griffin  at  the  theatre  one 
day,  Mary  was  astonished  and  delighted  to  be 
asked  to  play  Juliet  at  a  special  performance, 
but  two  nights  later.  She  knew  the  part  well, 
joyfully  accepted,  and  literally  ran  home  to 
tell  the  news  to  her  mother.  The  published  an- 
nouncement ran  as  follows : 

Saturday  evening,  November  27,  1875,  Miss  Mary 
Anderson,  a  young  lady  of  this  city,  will  make  her 
first  appearance  on  any  stage  as  Juliet  in  Shake- 
speare's Romeo  and  JuUet;  Milnes  Levick  as  Mer- 
cutio,  and  a  powerful  cast  of  characters. 

There  was  but  one  rehearsal,  on  the  day  be- 
fore; and  on  this  occasion  Mary's  ideals  suf- 
fered their  first  severe  blow.  The  other  actors 
regarded  her  as  an  unpromising,  awkward  up- 
start, and  were  markedly  unhelpful  and  even 
hostile.  ^ 

At  this  time  she  was  sixteen ;  the  train  of  her 
gown  was  the  first  she  had  ever  worn ;  she  had 
never  before  faced  a  real  audience  from  a  real 


238      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

stage ;  she  had  had  but  one  imperfect  rehearsal 
with  her  fellow  actors ;  yet  she  roused  the  house 
to  genuine  enthusiasm.  This  cordial  reception 
was  partly  due  to  the  first  appearance  of  a 
townswoman,  and  her  impersonation  was  cer- 
tainly not  without  its  crudities;  yet  the  news- 
paper accounts  of  the  evening  contain  such 
comments  as  these:  "We  are  sure  that  last 
night  saw  the  beginning  of  a  career  which  will 
shed  radiance  on  the  American  stage  ' ' ;  '  '  Her 
achievement  last  night  may  be  fairly  classed  as 
remarkable  ";  "  With  but  little  further  train- 
ing and  experience  she  will  stand  among 
the  foremost  actresses."  The  audience  was 
thrilled  by  her  rich  and  powerful  voice,  and 
impressed  by  her  beauty  and  vigor.4 

Mary  Anderson's  career  was  thus  suddenly 
and  on  the  whole  auspiciously  begun.  It  was 
the  old  story  of  being  prepared  when  the  oppor- 
tunity presented  itself.5  After  waiting  three 

*One  who  was  present  told  William  Winter  "that  notwith- 
standing the  conditions  inseparable  from  youth  and  inex- 
perience, it  was  a  performance  of  extraordinary  fire,  feeling 
and  promise.  Its  paramount  beauty,  he  said,  was  its  vocal- 
ism.  Miss  Anderson's  voice,  indeed,  was  always  her  pre- 
dominant charm.  Certain  tones  of  it — so  thrilling,  so  full 
of  wild  passion  and  inexpressible  melancholy — went  straight 
to  the  heart,  and  brought  tears  into  the  eyes." — Other  Days. 

Throughout  her  career  all  observers  noted  the  richness  and 
expressiveness  of  Mary  Anderson's  voice,  especially  its  thrill- 
ing lower  tones.  After  she  retired  from  the  stage,  indeed,  she 
paid  considerable  attention  to  singing,  and  once,  sang  in  public, 
in  a  small  way,  for  charity. 

5  Henry  Watterson,  the  journalist  of  Louisville  and  one  of 
Miss  Anderson's  earliest  friends  and  advisers,  tells  this  story 
to  indicate  the  self-reliance  that  was  the  cue  to  her  success: 


MARY  ANDERSON  239 

months,  during  which  she  learned  new  parts, 
she  was  offered  a  week  at  the  Louisville 
Theatre,  in  which  she  was  to  act,  besides  Juliet, 
Bianca  in  Fazio,  Julia  in  The  Hunchback, 
Evadne  in  the  play  of  that  name,  and  Pauline 
in  The  Lady  of  Lyons.  This  week  was  a  dis- 
appointment, for  the  Louisville  public  did  not 
turn  out  in  the  numbers  anticipated  to  see  their 
young  actress.  But  in  the  week  in  St.  Louis 
which  soon  followed  she  was  moderately  suc- 
cessful. Then  came  two  weeks  in  New  Orleans. 
Miss  Anderson's  reputation  had  not  reached  so 
far,  and  the  house  had  to  be  heavily  " papered" 
the  first  night  to  insure  a  respectably  sized  audi- 
ence. The  business  steadily  improved,  how- 
ever, and  by  the  end  of  the  two  weeks  her  suc- 
cess was  almost  overwhelming,6  coming  as  it 
did  in  a  strange  city  and  on  the  heels  of  mod- 
erate fortune  at  home.  The  students  of  the 
Military  College  showered  her  with  flowers,  she 
was  made  an  honorary  member  of  the  famous 
Washington  Artillery  Battalion,  and  as  she 
rode  away  from  the  city  in  the  special  car  which 

"On  one  occasion,  after  a  long  discussion,  the  counselor 
whom  she  had  sought,  quite  worn  out  with  his  failure  to  con- 
vince her,  exclaimed  with  some  irritation:  'Don't  you  know 
that  I  am  double  your  age,  and  have  gone  over  all  this  ground, 
and  can't  be  mistaken?'  'No,'  she  coolly  replied,  'I  don't 
know  anything  I  have  not  gone  over  myself.'  She  considered 
everything  that  was  relevant,  consulted  everybody  who  could 
give  information,  and  decided  for  herself." 

«  It  was  during  this  engagement,  that  the  young  actress 
played  for  the  first  time  the  character  of  Meg  Merriles,  thus, 
perhaps  unwisely,  challenging  comparison  with  Charlotte 
Cushman,  who  had  made  the  part  peculiarly  her  own. 


240      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

the  railroad  had  placed  at  her  disposal,  Gen- 
erals Beauregard  and  Hood  and  other  distin- 
guished Southerners  were  at  the  station  to  bid 
her  farewell. 

But  if  the  New  Orleans  engagement  was  little 
less  than  a  triumph,  her  next  important  ven- 
ture, in  San  Francisco,  was  nothing  more  than 
a  disaster.  It  is  an  example  of  the  heart-break- 
ing trials  that  come  to  the  most  successful  ac- 
tors that  Mary  Anderson,  phenomenally  fortu- 
nate so  far,  failed  dismally  in  San  Francisco 
with  both  public  and  press.  The  engagement 
was  at  John  McCullough's  theatre,  and  it  was 
only  on  the  last  two  nights  that  she  made  the  an- 
ticipated favorable  impression.  Much  of  this 
trouble  originated  with  the  indifference  or 
worse  of  her  fellow  actors,  the  members  of  the 
resident  stock  company.  In  those  days  a  trav- 
eling "star,"  instead  of  taking  with  him  on  his 
tours  his  own  company,  as  at  present,  went 
practically  alone  and  depended  for  support  on 
the  permanent  stock  company  in  each  town — 
a  system  which  did  not  make  for  artistic  ex- 
cellence, and  which  often  gave  occasion  to  just 
such  jealousy  and  hostility  as  helped  to  make 
Mary  Anderson's  stay  in  San  Francisco  un- 
happy. There  was  one  bright  spot,  however. 
Edwin  Booth  was  in  the  city,  and  she  met  him 
for  the  first  time.  When  she  was  tempted  to 
quit  the  stage  disheartened,  he  said  to  her: 
"I  have  sat  through  two  of  your  performances 
from  beginning  to  end — the  first  time  I  have 
done  such  a  thing  in  years — and  I  have  not 


MARY  ANDERSON  241 

only  been  interested  but  impressed  and  de- 
lighted. You  have  begun  well.  Continue,  and 
you  are  sure  of  success  in  the  end."  The 
words  were  of  immense  encouragement. 

There  followed  a  tour  of  the  South.  In  con- 
trast to  the  venture  in  the  state  of  her  birth, 
Miss  Anderson  was  successful  everywhere. 
She  grew  fond  of  the  South  and  made  in  Wash- 
ington and  elsewhere  several  of  those  friend- 
ships for  which  her  career  was  noteworthy. 
There  was  a  quality  in  Mary  Anderson  that  at- 
tracted and  held  the  interest  and  affection  of 
the  people  best  worth  knowing.  In  Grant  she 
found  a  modest  simplicity  which  she  greatly 
liked ;  in  Sherman,  a  hearty  personality  and  an 
interest  in  what  directly  interested  her — the 
stage.  General  Sherman  was  a  good  enough 
friend,  indeed,  to  consider  himself  entitled  to 
correct  the  growing  girl's  tendency  to  stoop, 
and  her  illegible  handwriting. 

Still  in  her  'teens,  Mary  Anderson  was  by 
now  firmly  established  in  her  chosen  profession. 
The  period  just  past  had  been  full  of  discour- 
agements and  difficulties,  as  well  as  triumphs. 
Plunging  as  she  did,  without  any  training  to 
speak  of,  at  once  into  the  impersonation  of 
leading  parts  was  an  ordeal  bound  to  result  in 
occasional  failure.  She  afterwards  said  that 
she  would  not  wish  her  dearest  enemy  to  pass 
through  the  uncertainties  and  despondencies  of 
these  early  years — circumstances  which  she  left 
out  of  account  on  that  sleepless  night  after  see- 
ing Booth  in  Richelieu.  She  had  come  through 


242       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

the  San  Francisco  ordeal,  which  was  enough  to 
crush  the  spirit  of  a  girl  of  seventeen.  She 
still  suffered  from  want  of  systematic  training, 
she  was  still  painfully  conscious  of  the  crudities 
of  her  own  work,  and  she  lacked  even  the  ex- 
perience of  seeing  others  in  the  roles  in  which 
the  public  compared  her  with  tried  favorites. 
She  had  seen  Charlotte  Cushman  as  Meg  Mer- 
riles,  hut  as  for  Juliet,  Evadne  and  Bianca,  her 
own  feelings  had  been  almost  her  sole  resource. 
Like  that  of  Fanny  Kemble  and  Garrick,  her 
novitiate,  had,  after  all,  been  extraordinarily 
brief. 

There  followed  extensive  tours  which  took  her 
throughout  the  South  and  Middle  West,  to  Can- 
ada and  finally  to  the  goal  of  American  actors, 
the  larger  Eastern  cities,  Philadelphia,  Boston, 
New  York.  In  New  York  she  profited  by  the 
expert  advice  of  Dion  Boucicault  and  William 
Winter,  and  the  friendship  of  her  elders  in  the 
profession — Lawrence  Barrett,  Edwin  Booth, 
Joseph  Jefferson  and  Clara  Morris.  In  Boston 
she  formed  another  of  her  invaluable  friend- 
ships— with  Longfellow.  The  old  poet  and  the 
young  girl-artist  delighted  in  each  other's  com- 
pany and  after  her  engagement  was  over,  they 
went  several  times  to  the  opera  together.  Her1 
professional  success  in  the  Eastern  cities  was 
such  that  she  could  now  feel  that  the  ordeal  was 
passed — that  she  had  attained  fame.  Not  that 
she  was  by  any  means  universally  admired  and 
approved;  a  part  of  the  public  and  some  of 
the  critics  were  not  won  over.  Such,  while  ad- 


MARY  ANDERSON  243 

mitting  her  beauty  and  her  promise,  suspected! 
her  success.  It  was,  they  said,  too  triumphant, 
too  easy.  Yet  the  undoubted  fact  was  that  she 
had  won  her  public.  The  Boston  engagement 
was  unmistakably  successful  and  in  New  York 
she  enjoyed  a  "run"  of  six  weeks.7 

7  It  does  Mary  Anderson  nothing  but  credit  to  point  out  that 
at  the  time  she  was  first  claiming  the  attention  of  the  East 
she  had  not  yet  grown  to  be  quite  the  Mary  Anderson  the 
world  remembers.  She  was  already  beautiful,  but  she  was.  as 
yet  a  comparatively  friendless,  inexperienced  young  girl,  igno- 
rant of  much  of  the  art  of  the  theatre  and  with  undeveloped 
taste  in  dress;  yet  self-confident  and  perhaps  just  a  bit  spoiled. 
The  manager  of  the  theatre  at  which  she  played  her  first  en- 
gagement in  New  York  (in  November,  1877)  long  afterward 
remembered  its  details.  On  the  opening  night  "there  was 
about  three  hundred  dollars  in  money  and  a  good  paper 
house.  Never  was  a  Pauline  attired  in  such  execrable  taste. 
The  ladies  of  the  audience  could  not  conceal  their  smiles;  but 
in  the  cottage  scene  Miss  Anderson's  fine  voice  and  her  beauty 
captured  everybody.  Other  plays  followed.  As  Parthenia 
she  looked  a  picture  in  her  simple  costume,  and  her  manner 
of  saying  'I  go  to  cleanse  the  cup'  enchanted  the  audience.  As 
Bianca  in  Fazio  she  wore  modern  costumes,  and  but  for  her 
youthful  beauty  would  have  been  absurd. 

"On  the  first  night,  after  the  performance,  I  started  home 
for  supper,  when  it  occurred  to  me  that  perhaps  Miss  Ander- 
son would  like  something  to  eat  after  her  hard  work.  So  I 
called  at  Dr.  Griffin's  rooms  in  West  Twenty-eighth  Street  and 
found  the  future  Queen  of  Tragedy  eating  a  cold  pork  chop 
as  she  sat  on  a  trunk.  The  whole  party  accepted  my  invita- 
tion and  we  went  to  the  nearest  restaurant.  On  our  way  we 
passed  a  candy  store  and  Mary  looked  so  longingly  at  the 
window  that  I  asked  whether  she  would  like  some  candy. 
'Oh,  yes!'  she  cried,  and  jumped  up  and  down  on  the  pave- 
ment with  pleasure.  She  selected  a  pound  of  molasses  cream 
drops  and  commenced  to  eat  them  at  once.  The  supper  began 
with  oysters  on  the  half  shell.  To  see  Mary  Anderson  eat 
oysters  and  candy  alternately  was  terrible;  but  a  handsome 
girl  may  do  anything  unrebuked. 

"The  papers  were  very  kind  to  Miss  Anderson  during  her 


244      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODEEN  STAGE 

When  she  was  nineteen  Mary  Anderson  went 
abroad,  not  to  appear  professionally,  but  for 
a  vacation.  In  England  she  went  the  round  of 
conventional  sight-seeing,  much  like  any  other 
tourist,  but  in  Paris  she  saw  something  of  the 
French  theatre  and  its  actors.  Herself  accus- 
tomed to  the  broad  effects  in  acting,  she  was 
at  first  disappointed  by  the  restraint  and  finesse 
of  the  French  method.  Bernhardt,  then  in  her 
early  prime,  received  her  cordially,  saw  much 
of  her,  and  even  invited  her  to  play  Juliet  in 
Paris;  but  Miss  Anderson,  commendably  con- 
scious of  her  own  as  yet  imperfect  technique, 
declined.  Now  a  privileged  visiting  artist  be- 
hind the  scenes  of  the  Comedie  Frangaise,  she 
recalled  the  days,  not  many  years  before,  when 
she  and  her  small  brother  felt  so  privileged 
when  allowed  to  sit  before  the  curtain  of  the 
old  theatre  in  Louisville.  Eistori,  another 
great  actress,  was  friendly  to  Miss  Anderson; 
but  her  greatest  pleasure  she  found  in  the  treas- 
ures of  the  Louvre. 

She  returned  to  America  refreshed  in  spirit 
and  broadened  in  outlook.  She  was  now  in  her 
twentieth  year.  One  of  the  recognized  stars  of 
the  day,  her  name  and  her  acting  became  in- 
first  engagement.  She  made  a  success  of  youth  and  loveliness; 
but  the  public  did  not  rush  in  to  see  her. 

"After  a  while,  Henry  Watterson,  who  had  known  her  in 
Louisville,  came  to  town  and  took  an  interest  in  her.  He 
brought  with  him  ex-Governor  Tilden,  who  was  taken  be- 
hind the  scenes  to  be  introduced  to  the  new  star.  He  whis- 
pered to  me,  'What  a  remarkably  handsome  girl!  No  actress, 
but  how  very  handsome!'" 


MARY  ANDERSON  245 

creasingly  familiar.8  There  came  invitations 
from  various  English  managers  to  appear  in 
London,  but  Miss  Anderson  did  not  yet  feel 
ready  to  face  such  a  test  of  her  powers.  She 
contented  herself  with  starring  tours  which  took 
her  here  and  there  in  the  United  States  and 
Canada.  The  artistic  success  of  these  years 
was  a  varying  quantity.  As  we  shall  see, 
she  never  succeeded,  in  some  eyes,  in  attain- 
ing great  heights.  For  herself,  she  felt  that 
her  work  had  accomplished  some  good,  that 
her  dream  of  early  girlhood  was  to  a  de- 
gree fulfilled.  One  great  satisfaction  was 
that  she  was  often  assured  in  letters  from 
young  men  and  women  that  her  Ion  or  Evadne 
or  Parthenia  had  helped  them  over  crises 
of  despondency  and  temptation.  It  speaks 
well  for  her  nobility  of  nature  that  in  such 
tributes  she  found  her  most  gratifying  ap- 
plause. She  had  no  reason  to  be  dissatisfied 
with  her  measure  of  success.  Yet  stage  life  had; 
already  begun  in  some  ways  to  be  distasteful 
to  her.  She  disliked  the  constant  travel;  she 
sadly  missed  the  home  comforts  at  the  com- 
mand of  the  humblest  in  her  audiences;  the 
lack  of  ideals  in  those  with  whom  she  had  to 

s  Her  repertoire  at  this  time  (1879)  was:  Bianca  in  Fazio; 
Juliet  in  Romeo  and  Juliet;  Lady  Macbeth  (the  sleep-walking 
scene)  ;  Parthenia  in  Ingomar;  Berthe  in  The  Daughter  of 
Roland;  Julia  in  The  Hunchback;  Pauline  in  The  Lady  of 
Lyons;  Meg  Merriles  in  Guy  Mannering;  Evadne  in  Evadne; 
Duchess  of  Torrenucra  in  Faint  Heart  Never  Won  Fair 
Lady;  Ion  in  Ion;  soon  afterwards  she  added  the  Countess 
in  Knowles'  Love,  Galatea  in  Pygmalion  and  Galatea,  and 
Desdemona  in  Othello  (once  only). 


246      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODEEN  STAGE 

work  was  often  a  keen  disappointment;  and 
above  all  she  was  acquiring  a  keen  distaste  for 
the  extreme  publicity  of  stage  life — the  neces- 
sity of  constantly  submitting  herself  to  the  pub- 
lic gaze.  She  began  to  long  for  the  quiet  of 
domestic  life,  but  the  die  was  cast;  it  was  too 
late  to  alter  the  tenor  of  her  life,  and  she  bent 
all  her  energies  toward  success  in  a  new  oppor- 
tunity that  presented  itself. 

This  was  an  invitation  that  came  when 
she  was  twenty-four,  to  act  in  London,  at 
Henry  Irving 's  own  theatre,  the  Lyceum. 
Henry  E.  Abbey  had  taken  the  house  for  eight 
months  and  relied  upon  Miss  Anderson  to  keep 
it  open  all  that  time — a  formidable  task  for  an 
American  actress  new  to  London.  She  was  ex- 
tremely apprehensive  as  to  the  outcome.  Ar- 
riving in  England  in  the  summer  of  1883,  she 
passed  some  time  quietly  in  the  country  before 
going  up  to  London.  Eural  England  charmed 
and  rested  her.  At  Stratford  she  studied  her 
Shakespeare  in  Shakespeare's  own  house,  and 
spent  many  happy  hours  in  the  scenes  familiar 
to  the  poet  so  long  her  idol.  She  arrived  in 
London  three  months  before  the  date  of  her 
first  appearance.  She  faced  the  greatest  trial 
of  her  career  with  a  foreboding  that  was  not 
decreased  by  seeing  the  great  acting  of  Irving 
and  Terry.  When  she  chose  Ingomar  for  the 
opening  bill,  she  heard  predictions  of  failure 
on  every  hand — the  play  had  not  been  seen  in 
London  for  years  and  was  called  old-fashioned 
and  stilted.  But  Miss  Anderson  had  wisely 


MARY  ANDERSON  247 

followed  the  sound  advice  of  William  Winter 
in  choosing  Parthenia  for  her  first  London 
part,  as  she  thereby  avoided  awkward  and  pos- 
sibly unfriendly  comparison  with  English  fa- 
vorites. 

When  the  opening  night  came  the  thought 
that  almost  on  the  scene  of  the  triumphs  of  Sid- 
dons,  Garrick  and  Kean  she  was  to  venture  be- 
fore a  strange  audience,  filled  her  with  dread. 
She  found  in  her  dressing-room  flowers  from 
actor  friends  and  telegrams  from  Booth,  Mc- 
Cullough,  Lawrence  Barrett,  Henry  Irving, 
Ellen  Terry  and  other  cordial  well-wishers. 
When  she  made  her  first  entrance  she  was 
greeted  with  the  longest  and  heartiest  burst  of 
applause  that  she  had  ever  received.  The  first 
scenes  past,  and  her  apprehension  and  de- 
spondency somewhat  allayed  by  such  encourag- 
ing cordiality,  her  feelings  made  it  difficult  for 
her  to  speak  loudly.  A  kindly  voice  from  the 
pit  called  out,  "  Mary,  please  speak  up  a  bit!  r 
Her  nervousness  then  fled,  and  by  the  time  the 
play  was  over  it  was  plain  that  Mary  Anderson 
had  scored  a  brilliant  success.  Her  youth  and 
beauty,  her  admirable  vigor,  and  her  eight 
years  of  patient,  hard-working  acquirement  of 
her  art,  had  their  reward.  The  Lyceum  was 
crowded  nightly,  and  Mr.  Abbey,  who  was  pre- 
pared to  close  the  theatre  in  case  the  venture 
was  a  failure,  kept  it  open  for  eight  months. 
There  were  a  few  weeks  of  Ingomar  and  The 
Lady  of  Lyons  and  then  for  the  remaining  time 
Pygmalion  and  Galatea.  On  one  of  the  first 


248      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

nights  the  Prince  and  Princess  of  Wales  asked 
to  be  presented  to  the  actress. 

During  the  first  months  of  her  stay  in 
London  she  made  her  home — with  her  mother 
and  stepfather,  who  were  with  her  constantly 
— in  Maida  Vale,  a  secluded  spot  where  she 
was  free  from  intrusion  and  noise.  She  made 
many  quick  expeditions  to  scenes  made  fa- 
mous by  Dickens,  and  went  again  to  Strat- 
ford. After  a  while,  however,  she  moved  to 
a  larger  house  in  Kensington,  and  here  Lon- 
don society,  at  its  best,  began  to  find  her  out. 
As  in  America,  the  choicest  spirits  seemed 
naturally  to  gravitate  toward  her.  To  her 
informal  Sunday  afternoon  receptions  came 
artists,  literary  men,  and  statesmen.  The  "lit- 
tle bent  figure  with  its  great  kind  heart "  of  the 
novelist  Wilkie  Collins  became  familiar ;  Alma- 
Tadema,  the  artist,  was  another;  W.  S.  Gilbert 
of  Gilbert  and  Sullivan,  and  author  of  Pyg- 
malion and  Galatea,  naturally  took  a  personal 
interest  in  that  play,  and  wrote  for  Miss  An- 
derson a  new  "curtain-raiser"  for  it,  Comedy 
and  Tragedy.  Browning  she  frequently  met 
and  he  seemed  to  her  more  like  one  of  the  old- 
school  Southern  gentlemen  than  a  mystic  poet. 
Either  during  this  first  season  or  the  next  she 
numbered  among  her  friends  Mrs.  Humphrey 
Ward,  James  Eussell  Lowell,  then  American 
ambassador,  Edmund  Gosse,  Lord  Lytton, 
the  artist  Watts,  Gladstone,  the  novelist  Wil- 
liam Black,  Cardinal  Newman,  and  Tennyson. 
She  enjoyed  to  the  full  the  art  galleries  of  Lon- 


MARY  ANDERSON  249 

don,  the  opportunities  to  hear  the  best  music, 
and  all  the  various  activities  and  interests 
which  make  London  the  capital  of  the  English- 
speaking  world. 

Mary  Anderson's  success  in  London  was 
duplicated  when  she  appeared  elsewhere  in  the 
British  Isles.  She  was  enthusiastically  re- 
ceived in  Edinburgh  and  in  Manchester.  In 
Dublin,  the  good-natured  crowd  every  night 
took  the  horses  from  her  carriage  and  dragged 
it  through  the  streets,  while  those  running 
alongside  shouted  "Hurrah  for  America !"  and 
' i  God  bless  our  Mary ! "  It  was  in  Dublin,  too, 
that  the  ingenious  "gallery  gods"  sent  baskets 
of  flowers  down  to  the  stage  over  a  rope. 

Romeo  and  Juliet  was  the  play  determined 
upon  for  the  next  season  in  London.  A  trip  to 
Verona  in  quest  of  local  data  and  sketches  was 
to  occupy  the  summer.  "What!"  exclaimed 
James  Eussell  Lowell  when  he  heard  of  this, 
"going  into  that  glorious  country  for  the  first 
time,  and  in  the  flush  of  youth!  I  am  selfish 
enough  to  envy  you."  While  visiting  in  Paris 
Miss  Anderson  had  a  charming  interview  with 
Victor  Hugo,  who  proposed  a  reception  in  her 
honor.  But  she  pressed  on  to  Verona,  and,  like 
many  another  before  and  since,  found  the  old 
city  irresistible. 

The  Mary  Anderson  production  of  Romeo 
and  Juliet  at  the  Lyceum  in  1884  was  lavish. 
So  much  of  her  time  indeed  was  taken  by  the 
details  of  the  preparation  of  scenery  and  other 
accessories  that  she  had  scant  opportunity  for 


250      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

re-studying  her  own  part.  But  her  excellent 
memory  helped  her  immensely.  Once,  after 
Ion  had  been  dropped  from  her  repertoire  for 
three  or  four  years,  she  rehearsed  her  entire 
long  part  without  in  the  meantime  reading  it, 
and  with  hardly  a  mistake.  The  circumstances 
of  the  dress  rehearsal  of  this  production  of 
Romeo  and  Juliet  show  how  far  the  stagecraft 
of  the  day  had  departed  from  the  Elizabethan 
custom.  The  scenes  were  so  many  and  so 
elaborate  that  though  the  rehearsal  began  at 
seven  in  the  evening,  at  five  in  the  morning 
Eomeo,  Juliet  and  Friar  Laurence  were  still 
waiting  for  the  last  act  to  be  set.  At  eight  in 
the  evening  the  public  would  be  there.  Dis- 
couraged and  weary,  Miss  Anderson  could  not 
sleep ;  when  she  came  to  the  theatre  to  face  the 
"  first  nighters,"  she  was  tired  in  mind  and 
body  and  unfit  for  her  work.  The  strain  of 
that  performance  was  nerve-racking.  Yet  the 
audience  was  unaware  that  Juliet  had  all  she 
could  do  to  get  through  her  lines,  and  the  cum- 
bersome scenery  was  set  with  amazing  rapid- 
ity. The  play  was  over  at  half  after  eleven,  a 
great  success;  yet  to  the  actress  herself  her 
work  that  night  was  more  painfully  unsatisfac- 
tory than  any  other  she  ever  did.  But  she 
was  hard  to  please  where  her  own  impersona- 
tions were  concerned.  In  her  fourteen  years 
before  the  public,  she  was  satisfied  with  her 
acting  only  once  as  Bianca,  once  as  Ion,  never 
as  Perdita  and  only  once  as  Hermione. 
Eomeo  and  Juliet  ran,  however,  for  a  hundred 


MARY  ANDERSON  251 

nights.  Mary  Anderson  became  so  imbued 
with  the  sufferings  of  Juliet  that  she  continu- 
ally spoke  of  them  in  her  sleep.  It  is  typical 
of  her  that,  profoundly  dissatisfied  with  her 
impersonation,  she  constantly  restudied  and  re- 
modeled it  until  she  liked  it  better.  The  brother 
Joe,  who  used  to  gaze  with  Mary  on  the  green 
curtain  of  the  Louisville  Theatre,  was  the  Ty- 
balt of  this  production. 

At  this  time  (1885)  it  was  proposed  that 
Mary  Anderson  play  As  You  Like  It  in  the 
Shakespeare  Memorial  Theatre  at  Stratford, 
and  she  gladly  accepted.  She  had  never  played 
Eosalind,  and  she  studied  the  character  care- 
fully. The  occasion  aroused  great  interest, 
and  the  usually  placid  village  was  a  gay  place. 
The  journalists  were  there  from  London,  peo- 
ple came  from  far  and  near  for  the  play,  the 
stage  was  decorated  with  flowers  from  Shake- 
speare's own  garden.  The  audience  was  dis- 
tinguished and  appreciative.  The  dean  of 
American  critics,  William  Winter,  was  pres- 
ent, and,  in  his  words,  "It  was  for  her  [Miss 
Anderson]  that  the  audience  reserved  its  en- 
thusiasm, and  this,  when  at  length  she  appeared 
as  Rosalind,  burst  forth  in  vociferous  plaudits 
and  cheers,  so  that  it  was  long  before  the  fa- 
miliar voice,  so  copious,  resonant,  and  tender, 
rolled  out  its  music  upon  the  eager  throng  and 
her  action  could  proceed.  Before  the  night 
ended  she  was  continually  cheered."  After  a 
provincial  tour  ending  in  Dublin,  where  her 
admirers  gathered  in  thousands  under  her  win- 


252       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

dow  and  sang  Come  Back  to  Erin,  Miss  An- 
derson in  September,  1885,  returned  to  her  own 
country  after  an  absence  of  two  years. 

The  accounts  that  preceded  her  of  the  re- 
markable scene  that  took  place  in  the  Lyceum 
on  her  last  night  in  London  added  interest  to 
her  re-appearance  in  America.  One  who  was 
present  that  night  wrote:  " During  the  even- 
ing it  was  manifest  from  the  fervor  of  the  ap- 
plause with  which  she  was  favored  during  the 
performance  of  Pygmalion  and  Galatea  and 
Comedy  and  Tragedy  that  the  audience  was 
exceptionally  sympathetic,  but  no  idea  of  the 
scenes  which  followed  the  descent  of  the  cur- 
tain even  entered  the  wildest  dreams  of  any 
one  present.  The  audience  had  been  all  the 
evening  quivering  with  emotion.  As  the  cur- 
tain fell  Miss  Anderson  was  loudly  called  for, 
and  after  the  storm  of  applause  which  greeted 
her  presence  had  subsided  to  some  extent,  the 
lady,  who  was  transfigured  with  the  excitement 
of  the  moment,  said:  *  Ladies  and  gentlemen 
— the  dreaded  last  night  has  come — dreaded  at 
least  by  me.  I  have  to  part  with  you  who  have 
been  so  kind  to  me.  The  delight  I  naturally 
feel  at  the  prospect  of  returning  to  my  native 
country  is  tempered  with  a  great  regret,  sad- 
dened by  the  thought  that  I  must  leave  you. 
I  little  imagined  when  I  came  before  you  for 
the  first  time,  a  stranger  feeling  very  helpless, 
tremblingly  wondering  what  your  verdict  on 
my  poor  efforts  would  be,  how  soon  I  should 
find  friends  among  you  or  what  pain  it  would 


MARY  ANDERSON  253 

cost  me  to  say,  as  I  must  say  to-night,  "  good- 
bye "  to  you.  You  have  been  very,  very  good. 
I  have  tried  hard  to  deserve  your  goodness. 
Please  do  not  quite  forget  me.  I  can  never 
forget  you  or  your  goodness  to  me.  I  hope  I 
am  not  saying  good-bye  to  you  forever.  I 
want  to  come  back  to  you.  [Tumultuous  ap- 
plause and  cries  of  'Do!  Do!'  'Why  leave  at 
all?']  Dare  I  hope  you  will  be  a  little  glad  to 
see  me.  [Loud  cries  'We  will!'  'Yes!'  etc.] 
I  shall  be  very  glad  to  see  you.  [Immense 
cheers.]  Until  I  do,  goed-bye.  I  thank  you 
again  and  again.'  At  the  conclusion  of  the 
speech  the  cheering  and  applause  continued 
without  interruption  until  Miss  Anderson — • 
down  whose  cheeks  tears  were  pouring — had 
again  come  eight  times  before  the  curtain.  The 
audience,  which  by  this  time  was  on  its  feet  in 
every  part  of  the  house,  and  wildly  waving 
handkerchiefs  and  hats,  seemed  struck  by  one 
thought,  and  the  first  strain  of  Auld  Lang 
Syne  seemed  to  burst  simultaneously  from 
stalls  and  gallery.  People  who  had  never  met 
before  seized  and  wrung  each  other's  hands. 
Ladies  wept  and  flourished  their  handkerchiefs 
hysterically.  It  is  impossible  to  describe  the 
scene.  When  I  tell  you  that  it  lasted  for  fully 
half  an  hour,  you  will  get  an  idea  of  what  the 
Englishman,  whom  you  Yankees  call  phleg- 
matic, can  do  in  the  way  of  enthusiasm  when 
you  touch  his  heart.  It  was  an  ovation  which 
might  have  affected  a  monarch." 
The  American  tour  that  followed,  in  the  sea- 


254      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

son  of  1885-6,  took  Miss  Anderson  and  her  com- 
pany (the  custom  by  now  was  that  of  the  trav- 
eling organization)  not  only  to  New  York,  Bos- 
ton, and  the  other  cities  in  the  East  and  South, 
but  to  the  Pacific  coast.  New  York  did  not 
take  to  As  You  Like  It,  but  Romeo  and 
Juliet  was  a  brilliant  success.  A  public  re- 
ception in  Sacramento  proved  the  affection  for 
Mary  Anderson  of  the  city  of  her  birth,  but, 
strange  to  say,  in  the  single  night  she  played 
there,  the  people  of  Sacramento  provided  her 
with  only  a  meagre  audience.  In  San  Fran- 
cisco the  warmth  of  her  reception  was  very 
different  from  the  crushing  disappointment 
she  experienced  there  a  dozen  years  be- 
fore. 

Now  came  an  entire  year  of  rest.  Offers  to 
play  in  Spain,  Germany,  France  and  Australia 
were  refused.  The  glamour  of  stage  life  was  a 
thing  of  the  past  with  Mary  Anderson.  By  no 
means  blind  to  the  artistic  possibilities  of  the 
drama,  and  with  still  a  high  faith  in  its  moral 
function,  a  stage  life  for  herself  was  becom- 
ing more  and  more  repugnant.  She  felt  the 
need  of  calm,  of  normal  life  away  from  the 
glare  of  the  footlights.  The  winter  of  1886-7 
she  spent  in  Paris,  in  general  study  and  par- 
ticularly with  her  French  and  music.  It  is 
characteristic  of  her  that  with  a  chance  for 
recreation  and  social  life,  and  with  all  her  tri- 
umphs behind  her,  she  still  sought  to  mend  an 
education  she  knew  to  be  faulty. 

The  Lyceum  in  London  was  engaged  for  the 


MARY  ANDERSON  255 

following  year  (1887-8).  After  casting  about 
for  some  time  for  a  suitable  new  play,9  she 
again  fell  back  on  Shakespeare  and  decided  to 
give  The  Winter's  Tale,  "doubling"  Per- 
dita  and  Hermione — that  is,  playing  both  parts. 
It  was  not  an  easy  task.  To  Tennyson  she 
mentioned  her  fear  that  the  critics  would  not 
receive  the  venture  well.  His  reply  was: 
"  Thank  God  the  time  is  past  for  the  Quarterly 
or  the  Times  to  make  or  mar  a  poem,  play  or 
artist!  Few  original  things  are  well  received 
at  first.  People  must  grow  accustomed  to  what 
is  out  of  the  common  before  adopting  it.  Your 
idea,  if  carried  out  as  you  feel  it,  will  be  well  re- 
ceived generally — and  before  long." 

The  Winter's  Tale  was  not  enthusiastically 
received  on  its  first  night.  But  if  it  was  not 
at  once  a  critical  success,  it  was  a  popular  one, 
for  it  ran  a  hundred  and  sixty-four  nights  and 
could  have  continued  longer.  This  was  the 
only  time  that  Mary  Anderson  acted  the  same 
play  throughout  a  season.  It  is  worth  men- 
tioning that  the  Leontes  of  this  production  was 
J.  Forbes-Robertson.10 

9  Miss  Anderson  said  that  during  this  search  she  considered 
W.  S.  Gilbert's  Brantingham  Hall,  but,  as  the  chief  character 
was  not  adapted  to  her,  she  declined  it.     Gilbert  amusingly 
asked  her  if  this  was  because  she  found  anything  gross  in  it. 
"For,"  he  said,  "I  hear  that  you  hate  gross  things  so  much 
that  you  can  hardly  be  induced  to  take  your  share  of  the 
gross  receipts." 

10  On  the  occasion  of  the  one  hundred  and  fiftieth  perform- 
ance of  The  Winter's  Tale  at  the  Lyceum,  Miss  Anderson  was 
presented  with  a  large  laurel  wreath  from  which  were  sus- 
pended a  number  of  streamers  in  blue  and  gold,  and  bearing 
the  names — three  hundred  and  ninety-two  in  number—of  all 


256      HEROINES  OP  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

It  was  during  this  London  engagement  that 
Miss  Anderson  saw  much  of  Tennyson.  She 
visited  him  in  his  Surrey  home,  and  on  the  Isle 
of  Wight;  she  joined  him  in  long  walks,  rain  or 
shine,  in  the  country ;  he  read  and  talked  to  her 
for  hours  together  at  his  own  fireside.  He  pre- 
pared for  her  a  play  The  Foresters,  a  version 
of  his  pastoral  Robin  Hood,  and  they  visited 
the  New  Forest  together  in  search  of  ideas  for 
scenery;  but  the  play  she  never  produced. 

Mary  Anderson  was  to  have  but  one  more 
season,  or  rather  part  of  a  season,  before  re- 
tiring from  the  stage  forever.  She  has  become 
the  classic  example  of  the  actor  retiring  in  the 
midst  of  a  highly  successful  career.  She  has 
herself11  indicated  the  chief  reason  for  her 
choice:  " After  so  much  kindness  from  the 
public,  it  seems  ungrateful  to  confess  that  the 
practice  of  my  art  (not  the  study  of  it)  had 
grown,  as  time  went  on,  more  and  more  dis- 
tasteful to  me.  To  quote  Fanny  Kemble  on 
the  same  subject:  *  Never'  (in  my  case  for  the 

the  members  of  the  company  and  staff  of  the  theatre,  even  to 
the  call  boy.  In  the  center  of  the  wreath,  and  supported  by 
chains,  was  a  brass  tablet  with  the  inscriptions:  "En  Sou- 
venir of  the  One-hundred  and  Fiftieth  performance  of  The  Win- 
ter's Tale,  presented  to  Miss  Mary  Anderson  by  the  members 
and  employees,  Lyceum  Theatre,  London,  March  2,  1888,"  and 
on  the  other  side: 

"  'The  hostess  of  the  meeting,  pray   you,  bid  the  unknown 

friends  to  us  welcome.  .  .  . 

Come,  quench  your  blushes,  and  present  yourself  that  which 
you  are,  mistress  o'  the  feast.'  .  .  ." 

The  Winter's  Tale,  Act  IV,  Scene  4. 
11 A  Few  Memories — 1896. 


MARY  ANDERSON  257 

last  three  years  of  my  public  life)  'have  I  pre- 
sented myself  before  an  audience  without  a 
feeling  of  reluctance,  or  withdrawn  from  their 
presence  without  thinking  the  excitement  I  had 
undergone  unwholesome,  and  the  personal  ex- 
hibition odious.'  To  be  conscious  that  one's 
person  was  a  target  for  any  one  who  paid  to 
make  it  one ;  to  live  for  months  at  a  time  in  one 
groove,  with  uncongenial  surroundings,  and  in 
an  atmosphere  seldom  penetrated  by  the  sun 
and  air;  and  to  be  continually  repeating  the 
same  passions  and  thoughts  in  the  same  words 
— that  was  the  most  part  of  my  daily  life,  and 
became  so  like  slavery  to  me  that  I  resolved 
after  one  more  season's  work  to  cut  myself 
free  from  the  stage  fetters  forever." 

There  is  much  in  this  passage  to  give  pause 
to  the  girl  who  longs  for  a  stage  career,  for  the 
youthfully  ambitious  seldom  see  such  a  career 
in  its  true  perspective.  Mary  Anderson,  one 
in  ten  thousand  in  her  equipment  as  an  actress, 
one  in  a  million  in  the  triumphs  she  won,  yet 
was  eager  to  give  it  all  up.  On  the  audience's 
side  of  the  footlights  the  stage  is  (and  right- 
fully so)  a  place  of  beauty,  of  inspiration,  of 
revelation  of  the  truth.  To  the  actor  or  actress 
it  is  more  often  than  not  a  place  of  stern  toil, 
of  uncertainty,  of  disappointment  and  disillu- 
sionment. 

The  provincial  tour  following  the  London 
engagement  ended  at  Dublin,  where  the  public 
was  as  wildly  enthusiastic  as  before.  Some  of 
the  last  night  audience  even  went  so  far  as  to 


258      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

follow  in  the  same  train  to  Queenstown,  awaken- 
ing her  at  each  stop  with  cheers  and  greet- 
ings. 

There  followed  the  final  tour  in  the  United 
States.  At  Louisville  she  visited  the  scenes  of 
her  youth  and  received  the  congratulatory 
resolutions  of  the  state  senate.  She  had  begun 
the  season  with  as  much  zest  as  she  could  com- 
mand, but  the  strain  was  beginning  to  tell  on 
her  health.  At  Cincinnati  she  acted  with  dif- 
ficulty, but  completed  the  engagement.  At 
Washington,  in  the  middle  of  inauguration 
week,  in  1889,  the  crisis  was  reached.  "The 
first  scenes  of  The  Winter's  Tale  went  very 
smoothly.  The  theatre  *was  crowded.  Perdita 
danced  apparently  as  gayly  as  ever,  but  after 
the  exertion  fell  fainting  from  exhaustion  and 
was  carried  off  the  stage.  I  was  taken  into  the 
dressing-room,  which  in  a  few  moments  was 
filled  with  people  from  the  boxes.  Kecovering 
consciousness  quickly,  I  begged  them  to  clear 
the  room.  Realizing  then  that  I  would  prob- 
ably not  be  able  to  act  any  more  that  season, 
though  there  were  many  weeks  yet  unfinished, 
I  resolved  at  any  cost  to  complete  that  night's 
work.  Hurriedly  putting  on  some  color,  I 
passed  the  groups  of  people  discussing  the  inci- 
dent, and  before  the  doctor  or  my  brother  were 
aware  of  my  purpose,  ordered  the  curtain  to 
be  rung  up  and  walked  quickly  upon  the  stage. 
As  I  did  so  I  heard  a  loud  hum,  which  I  was 
afterwards  told  was  a  great  burst  of  applause 
from  the  audience.  The  pastoral  scene  came 


MARY  ANDERSON  259 

to  an  end.  There  was  only  one  more  act  to 
go  through.  Donning  the  statue-like  draperies 
of  Hermione,  I  mounted  the  pedestal.  My 
physician,  formerly  an  officer  in  the  army,  said 
that  he  had  never,  even  in  the  midst  of  a  bat- 
tle, felt  so  nervous  as  when  he  saw  the  figure 
of  Hermione  swaying  on  her  pedestal  up  that 
long  flight  of  stairs.  Every  moment  there  was 
an  hour  of  torture  to  me,  for  I  felt  myself 
growing  fainter  and  fainter.  All  my  remain- 
ing strength  was  put  into  that  last  effort.  I 
descended  from  the  pedestal,  and  was  able  to 
speak  all  but  the  final  line.  This  remained  Tin- 
uttered,  and  the  curtain  rang  down  on  my  last 
appearance  on  the  stage. "  12 

12  It  would  be  an  impertinence  to  doubt  the  good  faith  of 
Mary  Anderson's  own  statement  as  to  the  immediate  cause  of 
her  retirement  in  March,  1889.  It  is  nevertheless  interesting 
to  observe  that  at  the  time,  and  later,  the  newspapers  freely 
discussed  circumstances  which  do  not  enter  into  her  account. 
One  theory  was  that  adverse  critical  comment,  which  was 
found  in  many  reviews  of  her  acting,  disturbed  her  seriously, 
and  preyed  more  and  more  upon  her  mind  until  she  lost  faith 
in  her  own  power,  and  underwent  in  consequence  a  somewhat 
severe  nervous  prostration.  There  was  even  a  wide-spread 
report  that  she  became  mildly  insane, — which  was  promptly 
discredited  and  which  was  of  course  merely  a  piece  of  sensa- 
tionalism. Particular  mention  is  made  of  one  Louisville  critic 
who,  during  Miss  Anderson's  early  years  was  one  of  her 
friends  and  advisers,  but  who,  when  she  returned  at  the  height 
of  her  career,  sincerely  believed  her  spoiled  and  a  much  less 
fine  actress  than  she  had  given  promise  of  becoming.  He 
therefore  wrote  a  frank  and  fearless  analysis  of  her  acting, 
in  which  he  found  much  to  dispraise.  It  is  impossible  to  tell 
with  accuracy  how  much  truth  there  is  in  this  story.  Miss 
Anderson  herself  says  that  it  was  never  her  habit  to  read 
newspaper  criticisms  of  her  work,  except  that  someone  kept 
for  her  those  that  might  prove  helpful  and  that  these  were 
used  as  possible  hints  when  she  began  work  another  season. 


260      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

A  little  over  a  year  after  this  unexpected 
close  to  her  brilliant  public  career  Mary  Ander- 
son became  Mrs.  Antonio  F.  de  Navarro.  Her 
husband  was  a  native  of  New  York,  of  Spanish 
extraction,  and  like  herself,  of  Catholic  faith. 
They  were  married  on  June  17,  1890,  at  the 
Catholic  church  at  Hampstead,  London.  Dur- 
ing the  last  half  dozen  years  of  her  stage  career 
Mary  Anderson  had  become  almost  an  English- 
woman by  adoption.  Her  new  home  was  made 
in  the  little  village  of  Broadway,  Worcester- 
shire, and  there  she  has  always  since  lived,  en- 
joying the  peaceful  life  and  the  domestic  hap- 
piness for  which  she  longed  and  which  she  so 
richly  deserved.  She  has  two  children,  a  son 
and  a  daughter.  There  have  not  been  lacking 
attempts  to  tempt  her  again  behind  the  foot- 
lights. Enormous  sums  have  been  offered 
without  the  least  effect.  For  charity  she  has 
read  or  sung  once  or  twice  in  modest  programs, 
but  that  is  all.  The  people  of  Broadway  fairly 
worship  her  for  the  gracious  and  kindly  lady 
she  is.  Since  her  marriage  she  has  made  a  few 
visits  to  America,  and  the  American  public  of 
the  theatre  was  recently  reminded  of  the  former 
light  of  its  stage  when  she  assisted  Kobert 
Hichens  in  the  dramatization  of  The  Garden 
of  Allah.  But  Mary  Anderson,  though  she  is 
now  well  under  sixty,  for  a  quarter  of  a  century 
has  been  to  most  of  us  only  an  illustrious  name 
of  the  past,  and  to  our  elders  a  tenderly  treas- 
ured memory. 

The  estimate  of  Mary  Anderson  with  which 


. 

MARY  ANDERSON  261 

she  has  usually  been  dismissed  by  the  casually 
critical  is  that  she  was  not  a  great  actress,  but 
an  unusually  handsome,  charming  and  talented 
woman  who  is  memorable  chiefly  as  a  demon- 
stration that  the  stage  can  be  the  working  place 
of  a  wholesome,  womanly  woman. 

As  to  whether  she  was  a  great  actress  there 
was  and  is  a  wide  difference  of  opinion.  To 
her  more  partial  admirers  she  was  the  "  authen- 
tic queen  of  the  American  stage,"  who  in  each 
of  her  parts  "gave  an  individual  and  poten- 
tial impersonation. ' ' 13  "  Such  moments  in  her 
acting, "  wrote  William  Winter,  who  has  al- 
ways been  her  friend  and  admirer,  "as  that  of 
Galatea's  mute  supplication  at  the  last  of 
earthly  life,  that  of  Juliet's  desolation  after  the 
final  midnight  parting  with  the  last  human 
creature  whom  she  may  ever  behold,  and  that 
of  Hermione's  despair  when  she  covers  her  face 
and  falls  as  if  stricken  dead,  are  the  eloquent, 
the  absolute,  the  final  denotements  of  genius." 

A  great  deal  of  contemporary  criticism  was 
decidedly  less  enthusiastic  than  this.  While 
thoroughly  believing  in  Miss  Anderson's  devo- 
tion to  her  profession  and  her  conviction  of  its 
dignity,  many  good  judges  saw  in  her  a  woman 
of  talent  only,  not  a  genius.  The  art  of  the 
theatre  was  to  her  a  matter  of  the  highest 
ideals,  deserving  the  service  of  the  best  and 
noblest  in  the  natures  of  its  followers.  Yet  as 
an  actress  practicing  this  art  she  seemed  to 
many  incapable  of  placing  her  work  on  any  but 

is  William  Winter. 


262       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

a  personal  basis.  Insight  into  character,  it  was 
said,  was  impossible  to  her — her  Galatea,  Par- 
thenia,  Pauline,  Rosalind  and  the  rest  were  but 
herself  in  different  guises.  A  striking  instance 
of  her  lack  of  dramatic  insight  was  her  inabil- 
ity to  adapt  herself  to  W.  S.  Gilbert's  concep- 
tion of  his  own  Galatea.  He  wished  her  to 
suggest  the  comic  or  satiric  value  of  some  of 
her  speeches,  but  she  was  unable  to  bring  about 
the  necessary  subordination  of  her  own  per- 
sonality. The  heroic  and  obviously  tragic  were 
her  forte.  A  thoroughly  good  woman  herself, 
she  was  rigidly  confined  by  the  limits  of  her 
temperament,  as  well  as  by  her  views  of  what 
*v  stage  should  show,  to  the  delineation  of 
:!  women.  She  was  probably  quite  incap- 
able of  expressing  a  purely  animal  nature. 
"Her  acting  is  polished,  and  in  correct  taste," 
said  the  Morning  Post  of  London,  "what  it 
wants  is  freshness,  spontaneity,  abandon.  Of 
the  feu  sacre  which  irradiated  Eachel  and 
gives  to  Bernhardt  splendor  ineffable,  Miss 
Anderson  has  not  a  spark.  She  is  not  inspired. 
Hers  is  a. pure,  bright,  steady  light;  but  it  lacks 
any  mystic  effulgence.  She  is  beautiful,  win- 
some, gifted,  and  accomplished.  To  say  this  is 
to  say  much,  and  it  fills  to  the  brim  the  meas- 
ure of  legitimate  praise.  She  is  an  eminently 
good,  but  not  a  great  artist. " 

The  word  "beautiful"  is  sure  to  turn  up  in 
any  criticism  of  Mary  Anderson.  Never  was 
the  word  used  with  more  justification.  She 
was  '  *  a  classic  figure  gotten  by  mistake  into  an 


MARY  ANDERSON  263 

unclassic  epoch."  She  was  of  innate  dignity, 
tall  and  statuesque,  "of  imperial  figure, "  fair 
haired,  blue-eyed.  Her  features  were  finely 
chiseled  and  regular  and  at  once  suggested  the 
Greek  ideal.  Her  voice,  rich,  tender,  and  with 
wonderfully  full  bodied  and  expressive  lower 
tones,  was  one  of  her  chief  charms.  Many  men 
today  have  those  tones  still  echoing  in  their 
minds. 

But  the  spell  of  her  beauty  was  that  it 
seemed  more  than  skin-deep.  It  was  the  ex- 
pression of  a  noble  temperament,  the  beauty  of 
a  woman  of  high  feeling  and  sensitiveness,  and 
yet  of  dignity.  It  was  an  essential  part  of  her 
appeal,  though  this  was  not  an  appeal  to  the 
eye  alone.  It  was  the  beauty  of  the  actress, 
who  could  be  sincerely  concerned  first  of  all 
with  the  ideals  of  her  art,  of  the  woman  who 
could  say:  "The  highest  praise  I  receive  is  the 
knowledge  that  someone  has  gone  from  the 
audience  with  an  increased  light  as  to  the  de- 
velopment of  character,  a  higher  sense  of  moral 
responsibility,  a  better  spiritual  condition  for 
having  seen  the  play." 

Whether  or  not  this  beautiful  woman  was  a 
great  actress,  she  was  "our  Mary"  to  countless 
thousands,  and  such  a  title  is  not  earned  by 
commonplaceness  and  dignity,  however  beau- 
tiful. About  Mary  Anderson  there  hangs 
somehow  a  sense  of  enchantment,  of  the  real- 
ization of  an  ideal  of  loveliness,  joy  and  purity. 
And  whether  or  not  she  was  a  genius,  there  is 
something  heroic  in  the  amplitude  of  her 


264       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

career.  She  began  as  a  poor  girl,  living  in  an 
obscure  place,  without  connection  with  the 
theatre.  By  her  noble  aspirations,  her  zeal  and 
patience  in  their  pursuit,  and  her  modesty  and 
worth  in  their  fulfillment,  she  succeeded 
gloriously. 

In  the  autumn  of  1915,  in  a  performance  for  the 
benefit  of  one  of  the  British  war-charities,  Mary  An- 
derson acted  the  sleep-walking  scene  from  Macbeth 
and  the  balcony  scene  from  Romeo  and  Juliet. 


r 


MRS.   FISKE 


MKS.  FISKE 

ONE  afternoon  a  decade  ago  Minnie  Mad- 
dern  Fiske  journeyed  out  from  Boston  to 
the  neighboring  university  city,  went  to  San- 
ders Theatre,  scene  of  Harvard's  august  cere- 
monies, and  there  she  talked — engrossingly — on 
her  art.  The  occasion  was  in  a  way  memora- 
ble. In  times  not  remotely  past  the  possibility 
of  an  actress  lecturing  in  Sanders  would  have 
been  doubtful.1  But  in  1905  Harvard  was  well 
along  in  its  career  as  one  of  the  springs  of  the 
renaissance  which  has  of  late  years  manifested 
itself  in  the  English-speaking  theatre.  If  one 
said  "Professor  Baker's  work  was  beginning 
to  make  itself  felt"  it  would  be  saying  the  same 
thing  in  a  different  way.  In  many  respects  the 
occasion  was  unusual.  The  audience  was  in- 
teresting: the  professors  were  there  to  add  dig- 
nity and  academic  distinction;  the  students,  of 
Harvard  and  Badcliffe,  were  there  in  force  to 
represent  the  newer  spirit  of  inquiry  and  effort 
in  matters  dramatic;  the  stage  was  represented 
in  the  audience  as  well  as  on  the  platform  (and, 
oddly,  Francis  Wilson,  Edward  H.  Sothern  and 
the  speaker  cover  nearly  the  whole  dramatic 
range).  There  was  an  enthusiastic  expectancy 
in  the  air.  One  felt  that  here  was  the  mani- 

iDuse  furnished  the  only  previous  instance, 
265 


266      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

festation  of  something  genuine  and  strong. 
The  speaker  did  not  disappoint.  Poised  and 
confident,  eager  and  enthusiastic,  she  spoke  for 
more  than  an  hour  and  one  felt  at  the  end  that 
this  small  woman  had  signalized  a  new  spirit  in 
the  theatre  and  in  the  attitude  of  educated  men 
toward  the  drama  and  its  exponents. 

She  had  started  life  as  a  baby  actress  and 
her  formal  schooling  was  snatched  here  and 
'  there  in  the  midst  of  an  ever  busy  career.  Most 
men  (and  women)  can  exhaust  the  resources 
of  academic  training  with  a  total  result  less  bril- 
liant, however,  than  her  hour  on  the  stage  of 
Sanders.  But  it  was  only  one  form  of  a  recog- 
nition which  is  freely  accorded.  It  is  quite  safe 
to  say  that  since  the  death  of  Mansfield  she  has 
been  the  most  noteworthy  American  person  of 
the  theatre.  She  has  consistently  championed 
drama  of  a  high  order,  which  is  something 
superior  to  theatrical  art  of  a  high  order.  So 
much  would  be  true  if  she  remained  the  pro- 
ducer only.  Mrs.  Fiske,  the  actress,  has  placed 
herself  among  the  chosen  few.  She,  as  much 
as  any  other,  brought  to  bear  on  the  Ameri- 
can theatre  what  it  sorely  needed,  a  keen  in- 
tellect attuned  to  the  new  spirit  of  naturalism. 
She  was  born  in  a  lucky  day  for  this  purpose, 
for,  as  we  shall  see,  she  came  to  maturity  at 
just  about  the  time  when  the  rebirth  in  the 
English  drama  was  making  itself  evident. 

The  stage  always  attracts  to  itself  numbers 
of  people  who  no  doubt  sincerely  fancy  them- 
selves drawn  thither  irresistibly.  The  thea- 


MRS.  FISKE  267 

tre's  lure  is  strong,  yet  most  of  its  followers 
have  entered  upon  a  stage  career  more  or  less 
as  a  matter  of  choice.  With  a  small  number, 
however,  the  life  has  been  inevitable.  There 
has  been  no  choice,  no  attraction  or  glamour 
even.  Such  is  Mrs.  Fiske ;  she  is  indigenously 
of  the  theatre.  . 

Early  in  the  last  century  an  English  girl  of 
good  family  eloped  with,  her  music  teacher. 
Here,  perhaps,  began  Minnie  Maddern's  ar- 
tistic career,  for  this  girl  was  her  grandmother. 
After  a  while  this  music  master  brought  his 
family  to  America,  where  he  conducted  con- 
cert tours.  One  daughter,  Lizzie  Maddern,  the 
mother  of  Mrs.  Fiske,  not  only  was  the  youth- 
ful cornetist  of  the  company,  but  she  arranged 
the  music  for  the  orchestra  and,  indeed,  be- 
came a  musician  of  genuine  ability,  and,  later, 
an  acceptable  actress.  She  married  Thomas 
Davey,  a  pioneer  theatrical  manager  who  car- 
ried his  company  up  and  down  through  the 
South  and  West  in  the  days  before  personal 
management  gave  way  to  the  highly  impersonal 
direction  of  the  Broadway  offices.  Davey  was 
noted  for  his  invasion  of  small  unheard-of 
towns,  where  often  the  inn  dining-room  served 
as  a  theatre  and  scenery  was  of  the  scantiest. 
The  actor's  life  has  its  uncertainties  and  hard- 
ships in  any  age  or  country,  but  in  Western 
America  of  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury the  conditions  were  often  those  known  by 
the  strolling  players  of  old.  As  we  shall  see, 
Mrs.  Fiske  long  afterward,  and  for  quite  dif- 


268      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

ferent  reasons,  reverted  for  a  time  to  the  old 
practice  of  playing  on  extemporized  stages. 

On  December  19,  1865,  Marie  Augusta  Davey 
was  born  in  New  Orleans.  From  the  first  of  her 
stage  career,  which  began  almost  immediately, 
she  was  known  as  Minnie  Maddern.  There  is  a 
pretty  story  of  her  first,  quite  informal  stage 
appearance.  A  careless  nurse  had  left  the 
baby  unguarded.  She  climbed  from  her  bed, 
donned  her  clothes  and  went  out  in  search  of 
the  theatre  and  her  mother.  "I  forgot  to  cry, 
I  forgot  to  be  frightened,  and  I  saw  some  fas- 
cinating things  before  a  good-natured  fellow 
picked  me  up,  discovered  my  identity  and  took 
me  safely  to  the  theatre.  I  recall  distinctly 
being  held  by  my  new  friend  and  identified  at 
the  box-office ;  then  being  passed  over  to  a  boy 
who  took  me  around  to  a  narrow,  dark  door 
and  carried  me  into  a  lumbery  place  and  put 
me  in  a  chair  where  I  looked  out  into  what 
seemed  a  bright,  sunshiny  world  with  queer 
trees  and  fairies.  Just  then  I  spied  my  mother. 
She  was  dressed  like  a  fairy,  and  she  was  just 
coming  out  of  a  water  lily — for  it  was  the  trans- 
formation scene  of  a  spectacle.  I  slipped  right 
out  of  that  chair,  and,  before  any  one  saw  what 
I  was  going  to  do,  I  ran  right  to  her  and 
began  explaining  my  nurse's  treachery.  I  am 
told  that  I  was  received  with  applause,  and  that 
my  first  appearance,  even  though  it  was  im- 
promptu, was  a  success.'' 

Previously,  she  had  been  " taken  on"  when 
the  action  required  the  presence  of  a  baby,  and 


MRS.  FISKE  269 

soon  afterwards  little  Minnie  appeared  between 
the  farce  and  the  tragedy  to  do  her  songs  and 
dances.  At  three  came  her  first  premeditated 
speaking  appearance,2  as  the  Duke  of  York  in 
Richard  III,  and  from  that  day  to  this,  ex- 
cepting brief  periods  in  school 3  and  a  few 
years  at  the  time  of  her  marriage  to  Harrison 
Grey  Fiske,  in  1890,  she  has  been  continuously 
and  busily  engaged  in  her  profession. 

Her  career  divides  sharply  into  two  periods. 
To  the  first  of  these,  the  twenty-five  years  that 
carried  her  to  the  time  of  her  marriage,  she  is 
now  disposed  to  be  rather  indifferent.  When 
she  refers  at  all  to  that  time,  which  is  not  often, 
she  speaks  of  the  ' i  prehistoric  days. ' ' 4  It  was, 
nevertheless,  a  period  of  thorough  schooling, 
arduous,  but  fruitful  of  technical  excellence, 

2  At  Little  Rock,  Arkansas. 

s  At  different  times,  and  as  the  exigencies  of  engagements 
permitted,  in  Montreal,  New  Orleans,  Louisville,  the  Ursuline 
Convent  in  St.  Louis,  a  French  school  in  Cincinnati,  and  other 
private  schools. 

*  "A  person  less  given  to  reminiscence  than  Mrs.  Fiske  I 
cannot  imagine.  Upon  revisiting  in  her  professional  tours  the 
scenes  of  her  childhood  days  one  would  naturally  expect  a 
great  actress  to  remark,  'Here  is  where  I  made  my  first  ap- 
pearance,' or  'Here  I  played  the  Widow  Melnotte  when  I  was 
only  twelve';  but  I  do  not  recall  that  I  ever  heard  Mrs.  Fiske 
make  the  slightest  allusion  to  persons  or  places,  with  one  or 
two  exceptions.  She  was  appearing  at  Robinson's  Opera 
House,  Cincinnati.  As  she  entered  the  dressing  room  on  the 
opening  night  she  glanced  about,  and  then  at  me,  as  if  to  de- 
termine whether  or  not  it  was  safe  to  intrust  me  with  the  in- 
formation. She  then  remarked  that  when  a  child  she  was 
brought  into  that  room  to  see  Mary  Anderson  in  reference  to 
playing  some  child  character  in  one  of  Miss  Anderson's  plays, 
— Ingomar,  as  she  thought." — Griffith,  Mrs.  Fiske. 


270      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

and  bringing  early  triumphs — a  babyhood 
and  girlhood  apprenticeship  which  is  today, 
for  various  reasons  (one  of  them  being  laws 
in  some  states  restricting  the  appearance  of 
children  on  the  stage)  practically  inaccessi- 
ble. To  indicate  briefly  her  early  experience 
it  is  enough  to  say  that  before  she  was  sixteen 
Minnie  Maddern  had  appeared  not  only  with 
her  father's  company,  but  with  a  dozen  or  more 
of  the  stars  of  the  day,  Laura  Keene,  J.  K.  Em- 
met, Lucille  Western,  John  McCullough,  Joseph 
Jefferson,  E.  L.  Davenport,  and  the  rest  of  that 
almost  forgotten  day.  She  went  through  the 
whole  range  of  juvenile  parts,5  soubrettes, 
harassed  young  heroines,  boys,  fairies,  the  lads 
of  Shakespeare's  plays,  and  so  on  through  the 
list,  playing  wherever  the  need  of  a  clever  child 
actress  called  her.  She  wore  long  dresses  on 
the  stage  long  before  she  assumed  them  in  her 

B  The  parts  she  played  in  this  childhood  period  included : 
Duke  of  York  in  Richard  III;  Willie  Lee  in  Hunted  Down; 
Prince  Arthur  in  King  John,  and  others  of  Shakespeare's  chil- 
dren; Damon's  son  in  Damon  and  Pythias;  Little  Fritz  in 
Fritz;  Paul  in  The  Octoroon;  Franko  in  Guy  Ma>nnering; 
Sybil  in  The  Sheep  in  Wolfs  Clothing;  Mary  Morgan  in  Ten 
Nights  m  a  Barroom;  the  child  in  Across  the  Continent;  the 
boy  in  Bosom  Friends;  Alfred  in  Divorce;  Lucy  Fairweather 
in  The  Streets  of  New  York;  the  gamin  and  Peachblossom  in 
Under  the  Gaslight;  Marjorie  in  The  Rough  Diamond;  the 
child  in  The  Little  Rebel;  Adrienne  in  Monsieur  Alphonse; 
Georgie  in  Frou-Frou;  Heinrich  and  Minna  in  Rip  van  Winkle; 
Eva  in  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin;  the  child  in  The  Chicago  Fire; 
Hilda  in  Karl  and  Hilda;  Ralph  Rackstraw  in  Pinafore;  Clip 
in  A  Messenger  from  Javis  Section;  the  sun  god  in  The  Ice 
Witch;  children  and  fairies  in  Aladdin,  The  White  Fawn  and 
other  spectacular  pieces;  Francois  in  Richelieu;  and  Louise  in 
The  Two  Orphans. 


MRS.  FISKE  271 

own  person,  and  by  the  time  she  was  sixteen 
she  was  conspicuously  successful  in  old  woman 
roles ! 6  At  sixteen,  too,  she  became  a  star  in 
New  York,  though  this  venture  was  ill-advised. 
She  had  won  a  public  by  her  cleverness  and  her 
marked  personality,  but,  much  to  her  credit, 
she  was  not  adapted  to  the  crude  and  blatantly 
personal  form  of  entertainment  represented 
by  Fogg's  Ferry,  which  was  one  of  the  " pro- 
tean shows"  of  those  days.  She  was  to  wait, 
indeed,  many  years  more  for  the  beginning  of 
her  identification  with  really  significant  drama. 
During  this  young  womanhood,  from  sixteen  to 
twenty-odd,  she  acted  in  plays  which  are  never 
resurrected  nowadays  by  even  the  most  undis- 
criminating  stock  company,  and  which  are  re- 
membered, if  at  all,  by  some  old  theatregoer 
who  likes  to  recollect  how  appealingly,  in 
Caprice,  Minnie  Maddern  used  to  sing  "In  the 
Gloaming."  The  Storm  Child,  In  Spite  of  All, 
The  Child  Wife,  The  Puritan  Maid,  Lady 
Jemima,  Featherbrain — these  are  not  so  much 
as  names  nowadays,  even  to  those  who  know 
the  theatre  well.  She  had  gained  thorough, 
indispensable  training,  but  as  yet  no  memora- 
ble achievement.7 

«"The  extraordinary  thing  about  Mrs.  Fiske's  early  career 
is  that  she  should  have  been  even  permitted  to  play  the  range 
of  characters  that  she  did.  .  .  .  Frequently  a  young  woman 
who  is  physically  well  developed  easily  passes  for  a  much 
older  person,  and  the  eye  is  satisfied  even  if  the  ear  be  not, 
but  little  Minnie  was  little,  and  held  her  audiences  then  by 
her  genius,  as  she  subsequently  has  continued  to  do." — Grif- 
fith. 

7  It  is  of  this  period  that  Mildred  Aldrich  wrote,  in  her 


272      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

In  1890  came  her  marriage  and  three  years 
of  retirement.8    It  is,  for  many  reasons,  not 

article  on  Mrs.  Fiske  in  Famous  American  Actors  of  To-day: 
"It  was  twilight  on  a  very  cold  day  when  I  knocked  at  her 
room  at  Hotel  Vendome.  A  clear  voice  bade  me  enter  and  in 
a  moment  I  had  forgotten  my  cold  drive.  It  was  a  voice  which 
I  can  never  forget,  and  which  even  as  I  write  of  it  comes  to 
my  ear  with  a  strange  delicious  insistence.  As  the  door  closed 
behind  me  there  rose  from  the  depths  of  a  large  chair,  and 
stood  between  me  and  the  dim  light  from  the  window  a  slender, 
childish  figure,  in  a  close-fitting,  dark  gown.  The  fading  light, 
the  dark  dress,  threw  into  greater  relief  the  pale  face  with  its 
small  features  and  deep  eyes,  above  and  around  which,  like  a 
halo,  was  a  wealth  of  curling  red  hair.  I  had  been  told  that 
she  was  young;  but  I  was  not  prepared  for  any  such  unique 
personality  as  hers,  and  I  still  remember  the  sensation  of  the 
surprise  she  was  to  me  as  a  most  delightful  experience.  This 
was  not  the  conventional  young  actress  to  whom  I  have  been 
accustomed;  this  slight,  undeveloped  figure,  in  its  straight, 
girlish  gown  reaching  only  to  the  slender  ankles.  There  was 
a  pretty  assumption  of  dignity;  there  was  a  constant  crop- 
ping out  in  bearing,  in  speech,  in  humor  and  in  gestures  of 
delicious,  inimitable,  unconcealable  youth  which  was  most 
fetching  and  which  had  something  so  infinitely  touching  in  it. 

"I  have  never  encountered  a  face  more  variable.  At  one 
moment  I  would  think  her  beautiful.  The  next  instant  a 
quick  turn  of  the  head  would  give  me  a  different  view  of  the 
face  and  I  would  say  to  myself,  'She  is  plain';  then  she  would 
speak,  and  that  beautiful  musical  mezzo,  so  uncommon  to 
American  ears,  and  from  which  a  Boston  man  once  emotionally 
declared  'feeling  could  be  positively  wrung,  so  over-saturated 
was  it,'  would  touch  my  heart  and  all  else  would  be  forgotten. 
Such  was  Minnie  Maddern  when  I  first  met  her  on  her  eight- 
eenth birthday." 

«  This  was  not  her  first  marriage.  She  had  been  married 
when  she  was  about  sixteen  to  LeGrand  White,  a  musician  and 
theatrical  manager.  They  were  divorced  about  two  years  be- 
fore she  married  Mr.  Fiske. 

"For  two  years  before  her  marriage  [to  Mr.  Fiske]  she  had 
been  continually  worried  with  the  theatre  and  her  rest  was  a 
welcome  one.  She  had  many  interests  beside  the  stage,  and 
loved  to  get  away  to  a  little  cottage,  at  Larchmont,  where  she 


MRS.  FISKE  273 

strange  that  when  she  again  took  up  her  stage 
career  a  new  era  seemed  to  begin  for  her.  Not 
only  must  her  own  nature,  her  insight,  and  her 
artistic  equipment  now  have  combined  to  qual- 
ify her  for  new  and  greater  efforts;  the 
whole  English  speaking  theatre  was  gaining  a 
new  lease  of  life.  Arthur  Wing  Pinero,  just 
emerging  into  his  period  of  sureness  of  tech- 
nique and  a  frank  facing  of  life ;  Henry  Arthur 
Jones,  dropping  his  earlier  melodramatic  man- 
ner and  about  to  produce  Michael  and  His  Lost 
Angel;  Oscar  Wilde,  with  his  momentary  flash 
of  high  comedy;  George  Bernard  Shaw,  watch- 
ful of  the  experimentation  of  others  and  in  ad- 
dition well  saturated  with  Ibsen ;  above  all,  the 
great  Norwegian  himself,  whose  influence  knew 
no  difference  of  language ; — these  men  were,  in 
the  early  nineties,  bringing  into  English  drama 
a  vigor  and  a  relation  to  life  such  as  it  had  not 
enjoyed  since  the  closing  of  the  theatres  in  1642. 
Mrs.  Fiske  was  keenly,  if  to  a  certain  degree 
unconsciously,  alive  to  these  influences.  To 
one  attuned  they  were  the  Zeitgeist.  With  an 
eagerness  new  to  the  American  theatre  she  was 
ambitious  to  attempt  the  modern  drama — a 
drama  honest  and  frank  in  its  outlook  on  life, 
free  from  conventional  restraint  in  its  choice  of 
themes,  and  taking  its  tone  from  the  realities 
in  human  character.  Not  always  have  the 

took  an  active  part  in  all  the  doings,  and  where  she  was  a 
familiar  figure  driving  a  little  yellow  cart  madly  over  the 
roads,  more  often  bare  headed  than  not,  and  always  with  that 
wonderful  red  hair  flying  in  the  wind." — Mildred  Aldrich. 


274      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

qualities  of  the  play  been  a  match  for  the 
powers  of  the  actress.  Yet,  looking  over  the 
period  since  1893,9  the  list  is  distinctly  note- 
worthy— first  of  all,  Ibsen,  who  found  in  Mrs. 
Fiske  a  ready  champion.  A  Doll's  House, 
Hedda  Gabler,  Rosmersholm,  The  Pillars  of 
Society;  surely  they  form  a  goodly  showing. 
As  for  other  Europeans,  we  have  Sardou  fur- 
nishing her,  in  Div organs,  an  opportunity,  bril- 
liantly embraced,  for  comedy;  Dumas  fits  is 
represented  by  La  Femme  de  Claude,  Suder- 
mann  by  Magda,  and  Hauptmann  by  the  short 
play  Hannele.  Two  of  her  greatest  successes, 
Tess  of  the  D'Urbervilles  and  Becky  Sharp  were 
unusually  skillful  and  satisfying  experiments  in 
that  difficult  form,  the  dramatized  novel.  Leah 
Kleschna  was  worth  while  as  an  attempt  to 
raise  melodrama  into  the  field  of  social  drama ; 
The  New  York  Idea  is,  so  far,  the  best  Amer- 
ican example  of  sophisticated,  ironic  comedy; 

*  The  list  of  productions  beginning  with  Mrs.  Fiske's  return 
to  the  stage  in  1893,  and  not  including  revivals,  is  as  follows: 
A  Doll's  House,  and  Hester  Crewe  (by  Mr.  Fiske),  1893; 
Frou-Frou,  1894;  The  Queen  of  Liars  (La  Menteuse)  and  A 
White  Pink,  1895;  A  Light  from  St.  Agnes  (by  Mrs.  Fiske) 
and  La  Femme  de  Claude,  1896;  Divorgons  and  Tess  of  the 
D'Urbervilles,  1897;  A  Bit  of  Old  Chelsea  and  Love  Finds  a 
Way  (The  Right  to  Happiness)  1898;  Little  Italy,  Magda,  and 
Becky  Sharp,  1899;  The  Unwelcome  Mrs.  Hatch  and  Miranda 
of  the  Balcony,  1901;  Mary  of  Magdala,  1902;  Hedda  Gabler, 
1903;  Leah  Kleschna,  1904;  The  Rose,  and  The  Eyes  of  the 
Heart  (one-act  plays  by  Mrs.  Fiske),  1905;  Dolce,  and  The 
New  York  Idea,  1906;  Rosmersholm,  1907;  Salvation  Nell, 
1908;  Hannele,  The  Pillars  of  Society,  and  Mrs.  Bumpstead- 
Leigh,  1910;  The  New  Marriage,  1911;  Lady  Patricia  and 
The  High  Road,  1912;  Lady  Betty  Martingale,  or  The  Adven- 
tures of  a  Hussy,  1914. 


MRS.  FISKE  275 

and  in  very  recent  days  Edward  Sheldon's 
plays,  Salvation  Nell  and  The  High  Road,  have 
been  courageous  and  justified  experiments — 
the  most  striking  examples  we  have  had  of  the 
encouragement  of  the  native  dramatist  of  the 
newer  school. 

The  capacity  to  key  oneself  to  the  inner 
meaning  of  a  play,  to  react  on  the  genius  of  the 
author  with  sympathy  and  insight,  sets  apart  the 
artist  from  the  crowd  of  mechanical  players. 
For  different  actors  there  are  naturally  differ- 
ent forms  of  this  power.  For  Mrs.  Fiske,  it  can 
be  said  that  her  genius  displays  itself  in  the 
naturalism  that  reveals  at  once  the  realities  and 
the  beauties  of  human  nature.  Let  us  see  how 
the  group  of  representative  plays  named  above 
has  represented  this  power. 

It  can  fairly  be  said  that  the  distinguishing 
mark  of  this  group  of  plays  has  been  its  close 
relation  to  actual  human  life.  This  is  of  course 
the  distinguishing  work  of  the  most  character- 
istic and  significant  of  modern  English  drama 
as  a  whole ;  but  there  is  much  more  of  this  sort 
of  drama  now  than  there  was  eighteen  or  twenty 
years  ago,  and  there  has  been,  until  very  re- 
cently, more  of  this  leaven  of  truth  to  nature 
in  the  British  theatre  than  in  the  American. 
Consider  for  a  moment  the  character  of  the  av- 
erage play  upon  which  the  public  in  the  United 
States  spent  during  this  period  (and  rightly 
enough  still  spends)  millions  of  dollars  and 
hours.  To  name  a  few  undoubted  successes: 
When  Knightwood  ivas  in  Flower,  The  Heart  of 


276      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 


Maryland,  Lovers'  Lane,  The  Christian, 
Down  East,  Secret  Service,  The  Music  Master, 
The  Man  from  Home,  Zaza,  Charley's  Aunt, 
The  Prisoner  of  Zenda,  Sherlock  Holmes,  The 
Chorus  Lady,  Rebecca  of  Sunny~brook  Farm, 
The  Woman,  Get-Rich-Quick  Wallingford. 
Without  denying  the  necessity  of  the  theatre  of 
mere  amusement,  of  light  sentiment,  of  melo- 
drama, one  feels  grateful  for  an  ambition  that 
has  sought  and  found  something  deeper. 

To  examine  Mrs.  Fiske's  plays  more  in  de- 
tail will  indicate  both  the  temper  of  the  modern 
realistic  school  and  the  quality  of  her  interpre- 
tations. 

As  for  Ibsen,  there  has  been  warm  dispute 
as  to  the  validity  and  helpfulness  of  his  mes- 
sage. Many  go  to  the  extreme  of  saying  that 
he  should  never  be  performed  at  all.  With  this 
question  we  are  now  concerned  only  so  far  as  to 
determine  his  attitude  toward  life  and  the 
drama  for  there  is  no  question  as  to  his  strength 
in  determining  the  tone  and  technique  of  lat- 
ter-day dramatists.  As  Mrs.  Fiske  herself 
has  said,  "the  most  interesting,  the  most  valu- 
able plays  written  by  others  are  almost  with- 
out exception  pieces  which  display  the  influence 
of  the  Norseman's  work.  It  would  be  an  im- 
pertinence to  say  that  Sudermann,  Fulda,  Pi- 
nero,  d'Annunzio  and  the  Spanish  playwright 
Echegaray  do  not  write  interesting  plays. 
They  do,  but  after  all  their  works  are  merely 
those  of  devoted  disciples  —  not  those  of  the 
master."  To  follow  her  in  her  Ibsen  creed 


MRS.  FISKE  277 

(and  she  has  the  best  critical  thought  with  her) 
is  to  believe  him  responsible  for  our  search  of 
truth  in  the  theatre,  for  the  truth  to  nature  that 
has  brought  a  toning  down  of  violent  action  and 
heightened  the  desire,  as  Maeterlinck  says,  "to 
penetrate  deeper  and  deeper  into  human  con- 
sciousness and  place  moral  problems  upon  a 
high  pedestal.  Bloodshed  has  grown  less  fre- 
quent, passions  less  turbulent ;  heroism  has  be- 
come less  unbending,  courage  less  material  and 
less  ferocious."  Ibsen  appeals  to  the  actor's 
imagination,  to  all  he  has  of  brain  and  soul.  In 
these  plays  also  the  sensitive,  discerning  audi- 
tor finds,  not  the  sordid  pessimism  with  which 
Ibsen  has  been  so  often  charged,  but  a  burning 
zeal  for  rockbottom  truth  and  sincerity  and,  in 
some  cases,  the  exaltation  of  tragedy.  It  is  to 
be  admitted  that  in  his  reaction  against  the 
drama  of  futile  romanticism,  the  "story  book 
play"  of  no  character  or  consequence,  Ibsen 
drew  what  were,  in  contrast,  grim  pictures. 

By  her  unmistakable  vocation  for  the  real- 
istic drama,  her  intellectual  acumen,  her  power 
and  habit  of  thinking  out  her  parts,  both  in 
their  larger  significance  and  in  their  revealing 
details,  Mrs.  Fiske  was  obviously  fitted  for  Ib- 
sen. The  restlessness  of  his  women,  their  cu- 
riosity, their  keen  concentration,  found  a  re- 
sponse in  her  temperament  as  her  blonde  and 
nervous  person  pictured  their  physical  aspect. 
Histrionic  methods  moreover  adapted  them- 
selves to  both  mood  and  matter.  It  is  interest- 
ing to  inquire  in  a  little  detail  what  these  meth- 


278      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

ods  were  and  are,  for,  with  modifications,  they 
characterize  all  her  work. 

The  keynote  of  Mrs.  Fiske  's  acting  is  akin  to 
that  of  naturalistic  drama  itself,  as  the  drama- 
tist himself  understands  it.  He  must  portray 
humanity  as  it  is,  with  the  selection  and  stress 
necessary  for  effectiveness  in  the  theatre.  His 
heroines  must  be  embodied  through  similar 
methods.  Such  impersonation  Mrs.  Fiske  ac- 
complishes with  the  utmost  economy  of  gesture, 
action  and  voice.  There  is  no  staginess,  none 
of  the  aggressive  grace  of  the  actress  playing 
a  part;  she  is  rather  the  woman  living  it. 
There  is  obvious  none  of  the  routine  technique 
which  actors  frequently  learn  of  each  other, 
or  in  schools.  This  is  not  to  say  that  her  style 
is  not  an  outgrowth  of  an  earlier  technique  of  a 
period  when  no  doubt  she  was  sufficiently 
"  stagey"  and  conventional.  In  the  later 
period  she  has  refined,  out  of  this  earlier  expe- 
rience and  her  own  insight,  a  method  remark- 
able for  its  suggestion,  its  repression,  its  free- 
dom from  familiar  device.  To  the  end  of 
theatric  effect  and  illusion  she,  like  all  artists, 
has  well  defined,  recognizable  means — some, 
like  her  wide-ranged,  emotion-charged  voice, 
natural  gifts;  others  more  or  less  deliberate. 
How  deliberate,  it  would  be  hard  to  say,  so 
closely  knit  in  good  acting  are  calculation  and 
instinctive  action.  Her  power  of  imparting 
the  details  of  impersonation  is  notable.  Ges- 
ture, walk,  pose,  facial  play,  intonation,  pause, 
all  are  worked  out  with  precision  and  yet  with 


MRS.  FISKE  279 

a  reticent  naturalness  that  makes  strongly  for 
effectiveness.  Particularly  convincing  is  her 
power  of  pregnant  silence.  In  Hedda  Gabler, 
"Mrs.  Fiske 's  power  of  ominously  significant 
silence,  of  play  of  feature  that  reveals  the 
working  brain  behind,  rises  very  high  in  the 
final  scene  with  Brack.  He  knows  her  share  in 
Lovborg's  ruin;  he  can  bring  his  knowledge 
into  play  in  the  sordid  theatre  of  the  police 
court.  The  price  of  silence  is  the  submission 
that  Hedda,  with  all  her  curiosity  and  zest  for 
evil,  is  too  coldly  cowardly  to  pay.  All  her 
tragedy  has  curdled  mean.  Her  only  refuge  is 
the  meaner  and  cowardly  escape  of  suicide. 
She  does  not  speak,  yet  one  sees  the  idea  ger- 
minate, mount  and  possess  her,  until  it  flowers 
into  reckless  action. ' 9 10 

In  the  first  act  of  Salvation  Nell  "Mrs.  Fiske, 
as  the  scrub  woman  in  the  barroom,  sat  holding 
her  drunken  lover's  head  in  her  lap  for  fully 
ten  minutes  without  a  word,  almost  without  a 
motion.  Gradually  one  could  watch  nothing 
else;  one  became  absorbed  in  the  silent  pathos 
of  that  dumb,  sitting  figure.  Miss  Mary  Gar- 
den, herself  a  distinguished  actress,  said  of 
this,  'Ah,  to  be  able  to  do  nothing  like  that.' 
In  Pillars  of  Society,  while  the  Consul  was 
making  his  confession  to  the  mob,  again  Mrs. 
Fiske,  as  Lona,  sat  quiet,  one  of  the  crowd ;  but 
gradually,  as  she  saw  the  man  she  loved  throw- 
ing off  his  yoke  of  hypocrisy,  the  light  of  a 
great  joy  radiated  from  her  face,  ending  in  a 

10  H.  T.  Parker   in  the  Boston   Transcript. 


280      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

stifled  cry,  half-sob,  half -laugh  of  triumph,  of 
indescribable  poignancy.  To  one  beholder,  at 
least,  it  brought  the  rush  of  tears,  and  made 
the  emotional  as  well  as  the  intellectual  drift 
of  the  play  completely  clear,  completely  fused 
and  compelling.  Is  not  this  acting  of  a  very 
high  order,  this  so  intense  living  in  the  whole 
life  of  the  drama  that  her  quietest  moment  is 
charged  with  tingling  significance?  Is  this  not 
true  ' impersonation/  indeed?"11 

Akin  to  this  power  of  eloquent  silence  is  Mrs. 
Fiske's  use  of  " felicitous  pause."  In  the 
middle  of  a  sentence,  sometimes  in  the  middle 
of  a  word,  will  come  a  momentary  halt  such  as 
anyone  in  real  life  is  constantly  making.  The 
effect  is  strikingly  realistic;  the  wonder  is  that 
many  others  have  not  discovered  and  profited 
by  its  simplicity  and  naturalness.  And  then, 
coupled  with  her  many  sided  faculty  of  repres- 
sion, is  a  power  of  sudden,  telling,  emotional 
speech.  Piercing  a  mood  of  charged  silence, 
a  sentence  spoken  in  Mrs.  Fiske's  eloquent 
voice  is  often  of  electrical  effect. 

By  such  methods,  she  made  Hedda,  "an  ab- 
normally evil  and  soulless  woman,  steadily 
plausible,  momentarily  potent,  always  conceiv- 
ably human. ' '  In  the  words  of  the  same  critic  12 
she  gave  to  Nora,  in  A  Doll's  House  "the  very 
semblance  of  life.  When  these  traits  (disdain 
of  convention,  curiosity,  self -concentration)  be- 
come abnormal  and  pass  over  into  morbid 

11 W.  P.  Eaton.  "E.  T.  Parker. 


MRS.  FISKE  281 

chagrin  and  recklessness,  sordid  selfishness, 
vicious  vindictiveness,  hard  soullessness  and 
mean  cowardice,  Mrs.  Fiske's  intellect  and  her 
temperament  follow  them." 

Mrs.  Fiske's  Eebecca  West  in  Rosmersholm 
excited  differences  of  opinion.  To  some  any 
Ibsen  play  is  a  brilliant  study  of  certain  phases 
of  life,  to  others  only  a  depressing  study  in  de- 
generacy. It  is  natural  that  the  actress'  work 
should  make  varied  impressions.  In  the  mo- 
ments of  intense  passion  she  rose  superbly  to 
the  occasion;  her  Eebecca  had  intellectual 
poise;  she  suggested  beautifully  Eebecca 's  re- 
nouncing love.  It  was,  as  far  as  it  went,  a 
portrait  equal  to  any  of  her  others,  but  in  a 
degree  she  failed  to  suggest  plausibly  the  fas- 
cinating half-intellectual  and  half-emotional 
force  that  gave  Eebecca  her  influence  in  Eos- 
mer's  house.  She  was  a  shade  too  detached,  a 
little  lacking  in  the  warmth  that  must  have  be- 
longed to  Eebecca 's  ideals  and  to  her  love  for 
Eosmer. 

One  may  frankly  admit,  indeed,  that  Mrs. 
Fiske's  acting  does  not  please  all  tastes.  What 
some  find  to  be  her  repressive  force  is  in  the 
eyes  of  others  "stilted  awkwardness."  The 
qualities  which  to  most  are  her  most  salient 
characteristics  are  to  some  her  "intolerable 
mannerisms."  One  comment  on  her  Hedda 
was  that  there  was  "not  a  large  or  spontaneous 
moment  in  it,"  that  it  was  "an  adroitly  artic- 
ulated mosaic,  an  assemblage  of  details,  all 


282      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

precise  exposition,  rather  than  a  jointless  and 
living  whole. "  Her  personality  has  been  de- 
scribed as  "cerebral"  and  "brittle,"  and  her 
art  as  "too  predominantly  intellectual."  At- 
tention has  been  called  to  her  "maddening  ris- 
ing inflection,"  and,  with  wearisome  reitera- 
tion, to  what  has  been  called  her  "unfortunate 
mannerism  of  runningallthewordsofasentence 
intooneanother. "  In  this  last  criticism  there 
is  a  measure  of  justice,  for  at  times  her  speech 
has  been  disconcertingly  rapid.  There  has 
been  improvement  in  this  respect  of  late  years, 
however,  and  to  those  playgoers  themselves 
temperamentally  adapted  to  enjoy  her  work, 
her  enunciation  has  been  seldom  indistinct,  her 
so-called  awkwardness  and  mannerisms  full  of 
significance,  and  her  "cerebral"  acting  and 
personality  the  means  of  true  impersonation. 

The  Pillars  of  Society,  since  it  is  a  social 
satire  rather  than  an  outright  tragedy,  afforded 
Mrs.  Fiske  as  Lona  Hessel  an  opportunity  for 
brilliant  comedy.  It  was  a  small  part,  too 
small  indeed  to  have  bestowed  on  it  her  powers. 
But  she  has  never  chosen  plays  for  their  "star 
parts."  She  made  Lona  a  delightfully  humor- 
ous, honest-hearted  woman,  a  masterpiece, 
within  its  limits,  of  satiric  comedy.  Especially 
fine  was  her  acting  during  Bernick's  confession 
to  the  mob.  We  have  already  seen  how  she  sat 
in  one  of  her  motionless  silences,  listening,  in 
her  face  the  joy  of  victory — a  joy  that  finally 
expressed  itself  in  "a  little  smothered  sob  of 
triumphant  love  which  no  other  American  ac- 


MRS.  FISKE  283 

tress  could  have  invented,  or  could  have  exe- 
cuted. " 

Mrs.  Fiske's  skillful  acting  of  the  lighter 
passages  in  The  Pillars  of  Society  gives  point 
to  a  contention  of  many  of  her  admirers — that 
she  should  oftener  be  seen  in  comedy.  In  the 
two  conspicuous  instances  of  her  ventures  into 
comedy — Divorgons  and  The  New  York  Idea, 
she  has  been  strikingly  successful.  In  Sar- 
dou's  play  she  acted  with  "a  refined  abandon 
that  was  positively  captivating,  making  Cy- 
prienne  deliciously  capricious  and  delightfully 
feminine."  The  New  York  Idea  William 
Archer  found  to  be  "a  social  satire  so  largely 
conceived  and  so  vigorously  executed  that  it 
might  take  an  honorable  place  in  any  dramatic 
literature."  It  is  an  example  of  high  comedy, 
the  comedy  "that  smiles  as  it  chastises."  The 
title  is  explained  in  one  of  the  lines:  "Marry 
for  whim  and  leave  the  rest  to  the  divorce  court 
— that's  the  New  York  idea  of  marriage."  In 
its  lightness  of  mood  and  speech  the  play  is  a 
comedy,  yet  in  the  author's  mind  the  underly- 
ing interest  is  serious,  his  purpose  being  not 
to  make  fun  of  or  satirize  true  love,  but  to  make 
fun  of  and  call  attention  to  the  frivolous,  incon- 
sequential attitude  toward  marriage  and  di- 
vorce. American  playwrights  have  seldom  at- 
tempted the  satirical  high  comedy  of  manners. 
The  New  York  Idea,  with  its  spirited,  delicately 
pungent  wit,  is  by  all  odds  the  best  example  so 
far.  Mrs.  Fiske  brought  to  bear  on  her  part, 
that  of  a  wife  whose  love  for  her  husband  per- 


284      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

sisted  after  divorce,  a  lightness  and  sureness  of 
touch  that  were  a  match  for  the  play's  best 
qualities.  Her  resources  of  changeful  mood 
happily  expressed  Cynthia  Karslake's  high 
bred  reticence  of  sentiment  and  rather  sophis- 
ticated gayety.13 

Tess  of  the  D'Urbervilles  was  written  by 
Lorimer  Stoddard  within  one  week,  but  the  re- 
sult was,  in  the  opinion  of  William  Dean 
Howells,  one  of  the  great  modern  tragedies, 
worthy  to  be  ranked  with  Ibsen's  Ghosts.  At 
least  Mr.  Stoddard  wrote  a  strong,  truthful 
play,  in  the  main  faithful  to  the  novel  by 
Thomas  Hardy  that  was  its  original.  It  was 
felt  at  the  time  that  the  American  stage  had 
risen  for  once  to  unaccustomed  literary  and 
dramatic  heights.  The  play  was  produced  in 
1897.  It  was  as  Tess  that  Mrs.  Fiske  fully 
"  arrived. "  Of  her  most  notable  characters 
only  Nora  in  A  D oil's  House  had  preceded. 
Her  abilities  had  been  generally  recognized  but 
until  now  play  and  part  had  never  so  fortu- 

is  In  1907  Mrs.  Fiske  took  The  New  York  Idea  on  an  un- 
precedented tour  throughout  the  West.  She  played  not  only 
as  far  South  as  the  Mexican  border,  and  along  the  Pacific 
coast,  but  even  went  into  the  Canadian  Northwest  as  far  as 
Edmonton,  appearing  in  many  towns  that  had  never  before 
seen  a  theatrical  company  of  the  highest  grade.  And  The  New 
York  Idea,  a  sophisticated  comedy  addressed  to  Eastern  au- 
diences, was  successful  everywhere.  At  Globe,  Arizona,  the 
audience  contained  hundreds  who  had  come  from  long  distances 
by  train,  stage  or  horse-back.  Calgary  demanded  a  return  en- 
gagement. At  Edmonton  the  play  was  given  in  a  rink  bn  an 
improvised  stage,  and  lasted  from  eleven  o'clock — the  time 
of  the  arrival  of  the  belated  train — till  two  of  the  early 
northern  dawn. 


MRS.  FISKE  285 

nately  aided  her.  She  was  not  Thomas  Hardy's 
Tess.  It  was  futile  to  expect  that  she  would 
be,  for  the  Tess  of  the  book  was  simple,  primi- 
tive, impulsive,  whereas  Mrs.  Fiske 's  art  was 
always  better  adapted  to  reflection  and  com- 
plexity. Such  qualities  she  gave  her  Tess. 
And  naturally  her  smallness  and  blondness  do 
not  at  once  suggest  Hardy's  heroine.  Yet  her 
work  was  enthusiastically  praised.  In  spite  of 
her  disadvantages,  in  this  part,  of  person  and 
method,  the  keenness  of  her  perception  of  her 
Tess  and  the  nervous  force  with  which  she  im- 
parted that  perception  to  the  audience  made  a 
deep  impression.  In  moments  like  that  in 
which  she  discovers  her  husband  to  be  ignorant 
of  her  past  life,  or  that  of  the  return  of  the 
supposed  dead  Angel  Clare,  her  power  of  re- 
pressed emotion  was  most  effective.  While  ac- 
tually doing  almost  nothing,  her  horror  and 
amazement  were  strongly  felt  across  the  foot- 
lights. The  few  sentences  to  her  husband  that 
recall  the  years  of  waiting  and  disillusion,  were 
simply  spoken  but  with  the  agony  of  Tess's 
pitiful  tragedy.  The  play  was  at  once  success- 
ful, and  the  admirers  of  Mrs.  Fiske,  who  had 
waited  long  for  a  suitable  opportunity  for  her, 
felt  at  last  satisfied. 

It  is  as  Becky  Sharp,  in  a  play  based  on 
Thackeray's  Vanity  Fair,  that  Mrs.  Fiske  is 
by  many  most  gratefully  remembered.  The 
author  was  Langdon  Mitchell,  who  several 
years  later  was  to  write  for  her  The  New  York 
Idea.  Vanity  Fair  is  of  course  an  immensely 


286      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

complicated  study  of  all  kinds  of  characters  in 
all  sorts  of  relations.  At  first  blush  it  does 
not  seem  promising  theatrical  material.  Mr. 
Mitchell  wisely  did  not  attempt  to  produce  a 
"dramatization,"  but  selected  the  most  dra- 
matic incidents  of  the  book,  took  the  bare  plot 
thence  and  wove  about  it,  largely  in  his  own 
dialogue,  a  well-constructed  play.  The  climax 
is  the  scene  of  Lord  Steyne 's  visit  to  Eebecca, 
with  the  unexpected  arrival  home  of  Eawdon 
Crawley.  This  scene,  played  with  consummate 
skill  by  Maurice  Barrymore  as  Kawdon,  Ty- 
rone Power  (and  later  George  Arliss)  as 
Steyne,  and  Mrs.  Fiske  as  Becky,  was  admit- 
tedly one  of  the  high  water  marks  in  the  his- 
tory of  American  acting.  The  scene  of  the 
Duchess  of  Bichmond's  ball  on  the  eve  of 
Waterloo,  with  the  stage  full  of  people  at  first 
gay  and  thoughtless,  and  then  in  succession  at- 
tentive, doubtful,  certain  of  danger,  terror- 
struck,  was  a  masterpiece  of  complex  and 
thrilling  illusion.  Mr«.  Fiske 's  Becky  is 
thought  by  many  her  finest  portrait.  Here 
was  an  opportunity  for  subtlety,  for  piquancy, 
for  brilliancy,  for  varying  moods,  for  humor. 
If  the  Steyne  incident  was  the  big  moment  of 
the  play  there  were  a  number  of  lesser  ones. 
In  the  half -comic,  half-tragic  scene  in  which 
Becky  wheedles  out  of  Steyne  money  to  pay 
Kawdon  ?s  debts,  Mrs.  Fiske  was  superb.  In  its 
uniformly  effective  acting,  its  literary  interest, 
its  legitimately  spectacular  appeal,  and  its  suc- 
cess as  an  experiment  with  the  native  dramatist, 


MRS.  FISKE  287 

Becky  Sharp  stands  strongly  forth  in  any  review 
of  Mrs.  Fiske 's  career. 

In  Mary  of  Magdala  Mrs.  Fiske  ventured, 
none  too  wisely,  into  the  field  of  poetic  Biblical 
tragedy.  Christ  and  his  teachings,  and  the 
greatest  tragedy  of  all,  form  the  substance  of 
the  play.  The  stage  management  was  impos- 
ing, the  production  sumptuous  and  accurate. 
Tyrone  Power  as  Judas  was  a  genuinely  tragic 
figure  and  in  the  strongest  scene — that  of  the 
temptation  by  the  Eoman  who  was  seeking  to 
have  Mary  buy  the  safety  of  Jesus — Mrs. 
Fiske  showed  great  power.  Yet  the  play  was 
superficial  and  often  clumsy,  the  treatment  of 
its  lofty  theme  incongruous,  and  Mrs.  Fiske 's 
acting  in  a  measure  disappointing.  She  lacks 
the  sensuous  in  her  temperament  and  method, 
and  on  the  whole  she  lacked  in  this  part  sus- 
tained power.  She  was  hardly  the  Magdalene 
of  the  Orient. 

More  surely  within  the  sphere  designated  by 
her  large  but  specialized  talents  was  Leah 
Kleschna,  a  strong  drama  of  the  redemption  of  a 
thief's  daughter  by  the  influence  of  a  man  whose 
house  she  attempted  to  rob.  The  narrative  is 
continuously  and  plausibly  interesting,  the  in- 
cidents of  great  dramatic  effectiveness.  The 
play  was  "modulated  melodrama" — an  effort 
to  lift  a  story  of  striking  incident  and  broadly 
drawn  emotions  into  the  realm  of  reality.  In 
the  light  it  throws  on  the  nature  of  the  thief, 
its  making  and  its  possible  breaking,  the  play 
had  its  social  bearing.  The  immediate  popu- 


288      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

larity  of  Leah  Kleschna  was  a  hopeful  sign  to 
those  interested  in  the  growth  of  a  worthy  na- 
tive drama.  With  some  point  it  was  asked 
why  the  author  had  not  placed  the  scene  of  his 
play  in  America  instead  of  Paris.  Mr.  Mc- 
Lellan  has  not,  perhaps,  borne  out  the  promise 
of  this  one  play,  but  it  is  interesting  to  note 
how  many  of  Mrs.  Fiske 's  later  plays  have  been 
of  native  writing.  To  be  sure  success  has  not 
always  been  the  result.  With  moderately 
gratifying  results  she  has  played  three  one-act 
plays  of  her  own  writing, — The  Rose,  A  Light 
from  St.  Agnes,  and  The  Eyes  of  the  Heart, 
all  written  years  before,  besides  a  one-act  play, 
Dolce,  by  John  Luther  Long.  The  New  York 
Idea  and  Salvation  Nell  are  both,  of  course, 
absolutely  American.  After  Mrs.  Bumpstead- 
Leigh  and  The  New  Marriage,  both  by  Ameri- 
cans, came  The  High  Road  by  Edward  Sheldon, 
the  young  author  of  Salvation  Nell.  The 
foreign-made  plays,  Rosmersholm,  Hannele, 
The  Pillars  of  Society  and  Lady  Patricia  have 
varied  this  programme,  but  it  is  plain  that  Mrs. 
Fiske  in  her  encouragement  of  the  native  dram- 
atist has  been  courageous  and  persistent  to  a 
point  that  few  of  her  rival  managers  have  cared 
to  follow. 

The  most  interesting  instance  is  Mr.  Sheldon. 
While  he  was  still  a  student  in  Harvard,  his 
Salvation  Nell  was  accepted  by  Mrs.  Fiske. 
Produced  in  1908,  it  made  a  curious  impres- 
sion. Without  the  contour  or  substance  of 
sound,  full-bodied  drama,  and  largely  depend- 


MBS.  FISKE 

ing  for  its  popular  appeal  on  the  faithfulness 
of  the  scenes  of  the  New  York  slums,  the  play 
nevertheless  showed  the  young  author's  gift 
for  situation,  and  afforded  Mrs.  Fiske  a  part 
well  adapted  to  her  gifts.  This  comment  is  al- 
most equally  true  of  The  High  Road,  of  four 
years  later,  which  Mr.  Sheldon  does  not  call  a 
play  at  all.  It  is  a  "pilgrimage"  in  which 
Mary  Page  is  taken  through  nearly  forty  years 
of  her  life,  successively  as  a  young  New  York 
State  country  girl,  the  mistress  of  a  rich  young 
artist,  the  awakening  young  idealist  rebelling 
as  she  matures,  as  the  woman's  labor  organi- 
zer, and  as  the  devoted  wife  of  a  distinguished 
statesman.  The  play  is  not  a  great  one,  nor 
even  a  big  one,  but  it  is  firmly  interesting  and 
the  range  of  effect  for  Mrs.  Fiske  is  obvious. 

Praise  for  her  steadfast  desire  to  search  out 
native-made  plays  cannot  be  too  strong,  and 
some  of  these  ventures  have  been  among  her 
unqualified  successes,  but  many  of  her  ad- 
mirers feel  that  Mrs.  Fiske 's  continued  experi- 
mentation with  the  newer  school  of  American 
dramatists  should  be  modified — if  modification 
is  necessary — to  obtain  the  thorough-going  effec- 
tiveness of  play,  player  and  production  she  has 
at  times  attained.  Let  us  have  more  Becky 
Sharps  and  New  York  Ideas,  even  if  it  must 
be  in  revival. 

One  important  factor  in  Mrs.  Fiske 's  suc- 
cess has  been  only  hinted.  The  married  life 
of  people  of  the  theatre  has  been  a  frequent 
and  sometimes  justified  cause  for  unpleasant 


290      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE    • 

comment.  In  the  case  of  Mrs.  Fiske  much  of 
the  success  of  the  better  known  half  of  the 
house  has  been  to  a  degree  due  to  her  husband. 
It  is  pleasant  to  record  this  fact — not  that  it 
is  a  unique  situation  (for  married  stage  folk 
can  be  normally  happy  more  readily  than  is 
thought)  but  because  Mr.  Fiske 's  share  in  his 
wife's  productions  has  not  been  wholly  under- 
stood. In  a  recent  letter  which  Mrs.  Fiske  dis- 
tributed to  the  press  she  gives  to  her  husband 
a  generous  share  of  the  credit  for  the  excel- 
lence which  has  always  marked  the  productions 
of  the  Manhattan  Company.  To  him  is  due, 
she  says,  the  taste  and  thoroughness  of  the  set- 
tings. The  play  which  she  was  giving  at  the 
time  and  which  gave  the  announcement  point, 
was  The  High  Road.  The  second  act  is  placed 
in  an  apartment  in  upper  New  York,  furnished 
by  an  artist  of  training  and  knowledge.  The 
scene  bears  this  out  in  a  way  that  strikes  a 
new  note  in  stage  decoration.  The  tapestries, 
the  reproductions  of  oil  paintings,  carved  doors 
and  mantelpiece,  the  furniture,  are  accurate  to 
the  last  detail. 

Mr.  Fiske  leased  and  managed  the  Manhat- 
tan Theatre  in  New  York  for  the  few  years  be- 
ginning in  1901.  With  this  theatre  as  head- 
quarters the  Fiskes  waged  vigorous  war  for 
eight  years  against  the  so-called  theatrical  syn- 
dicate, a  combination  of  theatre  owners  and 
producing  managers  which  had  for  years  been 
acquiring  the  leases  or  ownership  of  most  of 
the  theatres  of  the  country.  The  Fiskes  stead- 


MRS.  FISKE  291 

fastly  held  out  against  the  dictates  of  this  syn- 
dicate as  to  their  plans  for  tours,  and  preferred 
not  to  become  the  property  of  a  monopoly 
which  was  operated  primarily  for  its  money 
gains.  When  their  continued  resistance  was 
strengthened  by  other  " independents,"  the 
trust  made  it  increasingly  difficult  to  find 
theatres  to  play  in.  During  her  tour  in  1904 
in  Leah  Kleschna  Mrs.  Fiske  in  some  cities 
played  in  summer  gardens,  and  on  improvised 
stages  in  halls,  much  as  she  used  to  do  in  the 
old  days  of  barnstorming.  With  the  rise  of  a 
rival  syndicate,  a  rise  made  possible  partly 
through  Mrs.  Fiske 's  help,  the  lines  have 
loosened  and  the  Fiskes  have  no  longer  any 
difficulty  in  "booking"  their  plays. 

The  Fiskes'  organization  has  become  defi- 
nitely known  as  the  Manhattan  Company, 
though  they  no  longer  control  the  theatre  of  that 
name.  "As  a  producer  of  plays"  Madame  Ee- 
jane  once  said,  "Mrs.  Fiske  has  no  superior  in 
Europe."  The  uniformity  of  ability  in  the  ac- 
tors, the  adjustment  of  the  characters  which 
often  kept  Mrs.  Fiske  herself  in  the  background, 
contrary  to  the  usages  of  "stars,"  the  detailed 
excellence  of  the  stage  "business"  (as  the  ball- 
room scene  in  Becky  Sharp)  have  always  given 
the  productions  the  interest,  the  appearance  of 
life  itself.  It  is  familiar  knowledge  among  those 
who  have  closely  watched  the  American  stage 
that  Mrs.  Fiske  is  one  of  the  best  stage  direc- 
tors of  the  time.  The  careful,  extended  re- 
hearsal of  a  play  is  hard  work,  but  Mrs.  Fiske, 


292      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

with  the  active  nervous  temperament  that  de- 
mands hard  work,  is  equal  to  it.  She  person- 
ally directs  the  rehearsals  of  her  companies, 
and  when  one  remembers  Mary  of  Magdala, 
for  instance,  which  demanded  a  hundred  actors 
and  was  rehearsed  more  than  six  weeks,  or 
when  one  recollects  the  practically  flawless 
stage  management  of  any  Fiske  production, 
her  merit  as  an  imaginative  producer  becomes 
apparent.  Like  her  acting,  her  stage  manage- 
ment is  quiet,  effective,  tensely  alive. 

During  the  retirement  immediately  following 
her  marriage,  and  since,  Mrs.  Fiske  has  found 
time  to  write  a  number  of  plays.  A  Light  from 
St.  Agnes  is  a  one-act  play  of  much  dramatic 
power  telling  a  tragic  story  of  low  life  among 
the  bayous  of  Louisiana.  The  Rose  is  another 
one-act  tragedy  once  played  by  Eosina  Yokes 's 
company.  The  Eyes  of  the  Heart  is  likewise 
a  short,  play,  having  for  its  principal  character 
an  old  blind  man  who,  after  losing  his  fortune, 
is  kept  in  ignorance  of  his  poverty  by  his  family 
and  friends.  All  three  of  these  pieces  were 
played  at  various  times  and  with  considerable 
success  by  Mrs.  Fiske  and  her  company.  She 
wrote  several  other  plays,  some  of  them  longer, 
but  none  well  known  today.  John  Doe  was  a 
dramatization  of  a  sketch  by  Mr.  Fiske ;  Grand- 
papa, Not  Guilty  and  Common  Clay  were  all 
long  plays;  Fontenelle,  which  she  wrote  with 
Mr.  Fiske,  was  played  by  James  O'Neill; 
Countess  Roudine  was  written  with  the  help  of 
Paul  Kester  and  was  once  in  the  repertoire  of 


MRS.  FISKE  293 

Modjeska.  The  Dream  of  Matthew  Wayne 
was  also  written  by  Mrs.  Fiske. 

Mrs.  Fiske  has  said  that  the  life  of  an  actor 
is  intolerably  narrowed  if  he  has  no  interests 
outside  the  theatre.  Such  interests  she  has. 
The  strongest  is  her  devotion  to  the  welfare  of 
dumb  animals.  The  trapping  of  fur  bearers, 
the  cruel  conditions  in  cattle  trains,  lack  of 
shelter  on  the  ranges,  bull-fights,  vivisection, 
all  have  had  her  for  an  enemy.  Individual 
cases  of  cruelty  are  constantly  receiving  relief 
at  her  hands  and  to  various  allied  causes  her 
money  and  time  has  been  given  generously. 
She  often  makes  addresses  before  meetings  in 
the  interest  of  such  reforms,  and  at  such  times 
the  actress  is  quite  forgotten  in  the  humane 
woman.14 

The    often    discussed    limitations    of    Mrs. 

i*  "There  never  was  a  case  of  lame  or  scurvy  dog  that  fell 
under  Mrs.  Fiske's  notice  that  did  not  get  instant  relief.  A 
mangy  and  ownerless  mongrel  cur  on  the  street  never  failed  to 
find  a  friend  in  her.  If  she  were  in  a  carriage,  no  conveyance 
was  too  good  for  Towser  or  Tige.  Towser  or  Tige  might  never 
have  had  a  bath  during  all  of  his  unhappy  dog  days,  but  into 
the  carriage  went  the  friend  of  man,  and  the  coachman  was 
directed  to  steer  for  the  nearest  veterinarian,  who  was  forth- 
with subsidized  to  make  a  good  dog  out  of  a  very  much 
frazzled  one,  and  send  the  bill  to  Mrs.  Fiske.  All  over  this 
glorious  country  dogs  were  being  repaired,  boarded,  and  re- 
built as  good  as  new,  when  masters  were  adopted  for  them, 
and  'the  dog  that  Mrs.  Fiske  saved'  lived  his  allotted  span, 
and  expired  loved,  honored,  and  respected.  With  horses,  too, 
it  was  just  the  same.  I  believe  if  she  were  on  the  way  to  a 
matinee  with  the  house  all  sold  out.  and  an  abused  or  other- 
wise pitiful  case  of  horse  attracted  her  attention, — and  it 
would — she  would  sacrifice  that  matinee  before  she  would  the 
horse."— Griffith. 


294      HEROINES  OP  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Fiske  have  always  been  said  to  include  her 
physical  equipment.  She  is  no  Bernhardt  or 
Terry  in  stature.  During  most  of  her  career 
she  has  been  slender,  and  there  are  dozens  of 
women  on  the  stage  who  will  never  attain  a 
hundredth  part  of  her  compelling  personal 
power,  who  are  nevertheless  her  superiors  in 
superficial  beauty.  The  truth  seems  to  be 
that  in  her  has  been  demonstrated  again  that 
when  the  essentials  of  acting  of  a  high  order 
are  present,  actual  beauty  is  a  comparatively 
negligible  factor.  Nor  can  beauty,  to  a  degree, 
be  denied  her.  Her  face  is,  one  might  say,  of 
the  Scandinavian  type.  Her  hair  always  was 
and  still  is,  beautiful, — a  reddish  golden — radi- 
antly golden  when  dressed  to  advantage  and 
seen  in  the  glow  of  the  footlights.  Her  eyes 
are,  at  a  guess,  gray  (though  even  her  intimate 
friends  disagree  as  to  their  precise  color) ; 
they  are  large  and,  as  no  one  who  has  watched 
their  part  in  an  impersonation  need  be  told, 
expressive.  Some  have  complained  that  her 
carriage  is  not  graceful;  but  it  has  something 
more  and  better  than  grace,  for  it  has  sig- 
nificance, fittingness  in  every  walk  across  the 
stage,  every  pose.  With  more  justice  has 
comment  been  made  upon  her  enunciation, 
which  at  times  has  been  undeniably  too  rapid. 
As  for  the  voice  itself,  it  is  among  her  chief 
means  to  her  effects — wide-ranged  and  sensi- 
tive to  the  mood.  It  is  at  one  moment  charged 
with  emotion,  quivering  or  repressed,  at  another 
hard  as  steel,  and  again  simply  matter  of  fact. 


MRS.  FISKB  295 

The  contrasts  are  of  great,  and  probably  nicely 
calculated,  effect. 

The  high-minded  judgment  which  has  en- 
abled Mrs.  Fiske  to  select  plays  which  never 
have  a  false  appeal,  her  freedom  from  that  self- 
importance  which  distorts  the  meaning  of  plays 
for  the  sake  of  giving  prominence  to  the 
"star,"  are  indications  of  her  qualities  as  a 
woman.  She  has  broad  sympathies,  enthusi- 
asms for  affairs  outside  the  theatre,  and  cher- 
ishes no  inflated  notion  as  to  her  importance 
other  than  as  a  woman  of  the  theatre.  In  her 
travels,  or  visiting  other  theatres,  it  is  her 
habit  to  be  heavily  veiled  and  altogether  lack- 
ing in  the  " theatrical."15  She  is  much  more 
nervous  when  addressing,  in  sua  persona,  a 
small  meeting  in  the  interests  of  some  humane 
movement  than  when  facing  a  theatre  full  of 
people.  On  the  other  hand  she  has  an  unusu- 
ally keen  sense  of  humor,  and  some  of  her  best 
bits  of  acting  are  said  to  be  in  impromptu  ef- 
forts called  forth  by  some  circumstance  arising 

is  Mrs.  Fiske  at  one  time  was  fond  of  visiting  the  motion- 
picture  theatres,  heavily  veiled  and  sitting  in  the  back  of  the 
house.  The  better  grade  of  foreign  films  interested  her.  And 
she  has  recently  shown  more  broad-mindedness  toward  a  grow- 
ing art  than  some  actresses  much  lower  than  she  in  the  artistic 
scale;  for  she  has  herself  recently  acted  Tess  and  Becky  Sharp 
for  the  motion-picture  camera. 

"When  attending  another  theatre,  as  she  sometimes  does 
on  a  Wednesday  afternoon,  she  would  like,  if  she  could,  to 
occupy  an  obscure  balcony  seat,  or  at  the  back  downstairs; 
but  if  that  is  not  feasible,  and  a  box  must  be  taken,  she  gen- 
erally ensconces  herself  behind  the  drapery,  in  as  inconspicuous 
a  place  as  possible.  There  is  absolutely  nothing  of  the  spec- 
tacular or  'theatrical5  about  Mrs.  Fiske." — Griffith, 


296      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

within  the  "family"  of  her  company.16  One 
of  her  engaging  traits  is  her  complete  freedom 
from  the  spirit  of  rivalry  and  criticism  that 
sometimes  characterizes  actors.  By  those  close 
to  her  she  is  said  never  to  speak  ill  of  any  one. 
Indeed  her  acquaintance  among  other  "stars" 
is  limited;  while  in  the  world  outside  the 
theatre  her  friends  are  many  and  often  dis- 
tinguished. It  may  not  be  uninteresting  that 
Mrs.  Fiske,  unlike  many  of  her  profession,  likes 
"playing  one-night  stands";  that  she  does  not 
weary  of  the  endless  travel  of  theatrical  life; 17 

i«  "During  a  rehearsal  her  poodle  entered  the  theatre  and 
calmly  and  unconsciously  crossed  the  stage,  keeping  at  a  re- 
spectful distance  from  her,  however,  only  condescending  to 
notice  her  mistress  with  a  side  glance.  This  was  so  contrary 
to  her  customary  dashing  and  bounding  approach,  that  Mrs. 
Fiske  stopped  the  rehearsal  and  called  to  Fifi  to  come  to  her. 
But  not  Fifi;  she  merely  glanced  and  continued  her  dignified 
and  stately  promenade  across  the  stage.  Persistently  and 
with  authority  Mrs.  Fiske  ordered  the  queenly  Fifi  to  ap- 
proach. Not  for  Hecuba — no  approach,  only  a  pause.  Mo- 
hammed must  go  to  the  mountain,  and  Mrs.  Fiske  did  the  ap- 
proaching. Did  Fifi  grin,  or  what  did  the  slight  gleam  of 
white  teeth  portend?  It  was  merely  the  flash  of  lightning, 
for  the  thunder  came  soon  after  in  a  low  growl  of  defiance. 
Never  had  such  a  thing  happened  before.  This  impromptu 
play  was  good,  with  Mrs.  Fiske  at  her  best,  and  the  audience 
of  actors  stood  by  immensely  interested.  With  tragic  em- 
phasis Mrs.  Fiske  stamped  her  foot  and,  pointing  in  the  direc- 
tion of  her  dressing  room,  ordered  the  black  woolly  beast  to 
begone  and  quit  her  sight,  to  let  the  dressing  room  hide  her, 
and  a  few  things  like  that,  and  added  something  about  Fifi's 
bones  being  marrowless  and  her  blood  cold,  and  about  the 
absence  of  speculation  in  her  eyes  which  she  did  glare  with. 
Just  then  Mr.  Gilmore  remarked:  'That's  not  Fifi — that's  my 
dog  Genie/  Laughter — quick  curtain." — Griffith. 

17  "When  a  series  of  one-night  stands  was  being  played — and 
she  has  a  perfectly  frantic  fondness  for  them — it  was  our  cus- 


MRS.  FISKE  297 

that  she  is  continually  studying  to  perfect  her 
impersonations  or  to  prepare  for  future  work ; 
and  that  she  has  a  playful  dread  of  being  re- 
ferred to  as  "intellectual."  That  word,  as 
applied  to  Mrs.  Fiske,  has  become  hackneyed. 
The  warmest  admirers  of  Mrs.  Fiske  will  ad- 
mit her  limitations.  They  will,  indeed,  be 
grateful  for  them;  for  her  physical  and  men- 
tal equipment,  while  they  withheld  from  her 
certain  ranges  of  drama,  simply  forbade  the 
adoption  by  her  of  the  tissue  of  unrealities 
which  constitutes  conventional  acting.  Without 
either  losing  for  a  moment  the  sense  of  condi- 
tions imposed  by  the  theatre,  or  gaining  her 
effects  by  means  of  commonplaceness  set  baldly 
on  the  stage,  she  has  evolved  an  extraordinary 
realism  made  up  of  truth  to  nature  combined 

torn  to  charter  a  Pullman,  as  she  lived  in  the  car  instead  of 
in  hotels.  .  .  .  This  she  most  urgently  requested  to  have 
placed  'not  at  the  end  of  the  train.'  The  rear-end  collision 
had  mortal  terrors  for  her.  .  .  .  The  same  nervous  fear  ap- 
plied to  non-fireproof  hotels,  in  any  of  which  Mrs.  Fiske  will 
not  go  above  the  second  story.  .  .  .  Mrs.  Fiske  appears  never 
to  weary  of  travel,  and  while  she  objects  to  starts  ranging 
from  five  to  ten  o'clock  A.  M.,  an  earlier  or  later  leaving  hour 
does  not  disturb  her;  in  fact,  she  says  she  rarely  falls  asleep 
until  near  morning.  We  had  a  prohibition  against  ringing  the 
berth  bells  before  ten  A.  M.,  and  also  against  any  kind  of 
alarm  clock.  .  .  .  Very  rarely  Mrs.  Fiske  went  to  the  dining 
car  in  the  train,  her  dislike  for  making  herself  conspicuous 
being  very  marked.  This  modesty  was  exemplified  in  her 
fondness  for  veils,  as  she  always  wore  at  least  one,  and  more 
generally  two.  .  .  .  Her  unceasing  employment  of  time  when 
on  tour  is  in  study.  It  is  a  never-ending  labor,  and  one  that 
evidently  delights  her.  The  preparation  for  things  to  come — 
perhaps  a  year  or  more  ahead — is  always  in  her  mind.  .  .  . 
During  all  my  time  [thirteen  years]  with  Mrs.  Fiske  she  never 
lost  a  single  night  from  illness." — Griffith. 


298      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

with  a  sense  of  theatric  art  so  nicely  adjusted 
that  even  in  its  most  telling  moments  it  is  the 
art  that  conceals  art.  It  is,  in  the  last  an- 
alysis, a  method  that  is  the  visible  expression 
of  a  rich  nature.  And  by  the  unalterable  fix- 
ity of  her  high  aims,  the  dignity  and  strength 
of  what  she  has  tried  to  do,  she  has  earned 
the  gratitude  of  all  those  who  look  forward  to 
an  influential,  high-minded  American  stage. 

In  the  spring  of  1914  Mrs.  Fiske  revived  Mrs. 
Bumpstead-Leigh,  and  in  it  proved  herself  at  the 
height  of  her  powers  as  an  adroit  comedienne.  At  the 
beginning  of  the  season  of  1914-15  she  acted,  in  sev- 
eral Middle  Western  cities,  in  a  new  play  by  John 
Luther  Long  and  Frank  Stayton.  Lady  Betty  Mar- 
tingale was  an  ambitious  production  that  took  her  into 
an  unfamiliar  field,  and  that  promised  to  rival  Becky 
Sharp  as  a  feast  of  acting  and  spectacle.  It  was  a 
" costume  comedy,"  with  the  London  of  the  eighteenth 
century  as  its  setting.  The  play  was  unfortunately 
lacking  in  substance  and  dramatic  interest,  and  was 
withdrawn  after  a  brief  career. 


JULIA   MARLOWE 


JULIA  MABLOWE 

NONE  of  Julia  Marlowe's  forebears  was 
identified  with  the  theatre,  and  she  was 
turned  toward  the  stage  almost  by  accident. 
When  once  her  fate  was  determined,  her  abili- 
ties and  ambitions  were  nurtured  with  the  care 
and  privacy  given  a  prize-winning  rose,  and 
she  was  offered  then  to  the  public  almost  full 
blown.  She  was  none  of  the  wild  flowers  of  the 
stage — the  Ellen  Terrys  and  Minnie  Madderns 
— that  grow  into  a  recognized  position  so  grad- 
ually that  they  seem  to  have  been  there  always. 
In  her  sudden  leap  into  public  notice  Julia  Mar- 
lowe was  something  of  a  parallel  to  Mary  An- 
derson. Miss  Anderson  never  played  any- 
thing but  "star"  parts;  nor  did  Miss  Marlowe 
when  once  she  had  called  for  recognition  as  a 
grown-up  actress.  In  her  early  'teens,  how- 
ever, years  before  her  debut,  she  had  had  more 
than  a  glimpse  of  the  stage. 

Her  real  name  was  Sarah  Frances  Frost. 
She  was  born  in  the  little  town  of  Caldbeck,  in 
Cumberlandshire,  England,  and  was  brought  to 
America  when  she  was  about  five.  Her  family 
settled  in  Kansas,  but  soon  removed  to  Ohio, 
living  first  in  Portsmouth,  and  then,  when 
Fanny  (as  she  was  then  called)  was  about 
nine,  in  Cincinnati.  There  her  father,  who  ap- 

299 


300      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

pears  to  have  been  some  sort  of  skilled  me- 
chanic, died  while  she  was  still  a  child.  Her 
mother  was  married  again  to  one  Hess,  the 
proprietor  of  a  small  hotel,  frequented  by 
stage  people;  but  this  circumstance  seems  not 
to  have  been  a  determining  factor  in  the  young 
girl's  career.  Fanny,  with  her  sister  Annie, 
was  sent  to  the  public  school.1  One  day,2  when 
Fanny  was  thirteen,  she  came  running  home  to 
her  mother,  much  excited.  She  had,  she  said, 
a  chance  "to  be  an  actress  and  make  some 
money."  Colonel  Eobert  E.  J.  Miles,  a  suc- 
cessful manager  of  the  early  eighties,  was  or- 
ganizing one  of  the  numberless  juvenile  com- 
panies that  played  Gilbert  and  Sullivan's  Pin- 
afore throughout  the  country.  "He  wanted 
Fanny,"  said  her  mother,  "because  she  was 
pretty,  to  play  one  of  the  small  parts.  Well, 
I  did  not  think  much  of  the  stage,  and  was 
strongly  opposed  to  having  Fanny  undertake 
anything  of  the  kind,  but  she  persisted,  and 
finally  so  annoyed  me  that  I  partially  gave  my 
consent.  That  was  the  beginning  of  it." 

During  the  season  of  1880-1881,  and  the  two 
seasons  following,  the  young  actress  was  known 
as  Fanny  Brough — her  mother's  family  name. 
She  was  promoted  from  the  chorus  of  Pinafore 
to  play  Sir  Joseph  Porter,  and  she  was,  be- 
sides, Suzanne  in  The  Chimes  of  Normandy 
and  a  page  in  The  Little  Duke.  The  signifi- 

1  On  Ninth   Street,   between    Vine  and   Race. 

2  According  to   an   interview   with    Mrs.    Hess,    printed    in 
1897   in  the  Cincinnati   Commercial  Tribune. 


JULIA  MARLOWE  301 

cance  of  this  first  engagement  lies  chiefly  in  the 
fact  that  the  stage  management  of  the  company 
was  in  the  hands  of  Ada  Dow,  a  sister-in-law 
of  Colonel  Miles.  This  woman  had  been  a 
competent  though  inconspicuous  actress,  and 
she  was  a  good  stage-director.  In  one  of  her 
charges,  moreover — Fanny  Brough — she  had 
the  discernment  to  see  an  actress  of  exceptional 
promise.  It  was  to  Miss  Dow  that  Fanny 
Brough,  renamed  Julia  Marlowe,  was  later  to 
owe  her  early-won  position  as  an  actress  of 
genuine  attainments. 

Her  experience  in  operetta  young  Fanny 
Brough  followed  by  playing  six  weeks  as  little 
Heinrich  in  one  of  the  several  Rip  van  Winkle 
companies  that  sprang  into  being  after  Joseph 
Jefferson's  success  in  the  play.  The  Eip  in 
this  instance  was  Robert  McWade.  Then  came 
Colonel  Miles'  attempt  to  make  a  "star"  of 
Josephine  Riley,  in  the  season  of  1882-1883. 
In  the  company  were  Miss  Dow  and  Fanny 
Brough,  who  now,  as  Balthazar  in  Romeo  and 
Juliet,  had  her  first  Shakespearean  part.  She 
also  had  the  formidable  duty,  for  one  of  her 
years,  of  playing  Maria  in  Twelfth  Night.3 

During  these  few  years  the  possibilities  for 
greater  things  lying  in  the  young  actress  must 
have  become  more  and  more  apparent  to  Colo- 
nel Miles  and  Miss  Dow.  Soon  after  the  ven- 
ture with  Miss  Riley,  Fanny  Brough  disap- 
peared from  the  stage  and  was  taken  to  New 

3  She  was  also  Myrene  in  Pygmalion  and  Galatea  and 
Stephen  in  The  Hunchback. 


302      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

York  by  Miss  Dow,  and  there  put  through  a 
course  of  training  such  as  few  actresses  ever 
undergo. 

Off  the  stage  the  young  aspirant  was  a  rather 
awkward,  self-conscious  girl,  of  a  serious  turn 
of  mind,  imaginative,  and  like  the  youthful 
Mary  Anderson,  and  many  another,  an  enthusi- 
ast in  her  admiration  for  Shakespeare.  Years 
afterward  Julia  Marlowe  said  that  she  could 
remember  no  real  childhood.  She  had  gone  to 
no  children's  parties,  and  had  had  no  girl 
friends.  "The  experiences  which  come  to 
growing  children  as  part  of  their  girl  life  came 
to  me  only  as  part  of  my  stage  experience.  The 
first  long  dress  I  wore  was  not  as  a  girl,  but  on 
the  stage  as  Myrene  in  Pygmalion  and  Gala- 
tea." "At  this  time,"  says  one  account,  "she 
was  a  saucer-eyed,  yellow  skinned  girl,  of  a 
melancholic  temperament,  high-strung,  eager, 
restless,  and  unbearable  to  herself  when  unoc- 
cupied. Her  chief  joy  was  to  revel  in  the  woes 
of  tragedy  queens." 

Obviously  this  was  raw  material.  That  the 
same  girl  a  few  years  later  stepped  before  the 
public  in  the  large  Eastern  cities  and,  if  not  at 
once  financially  successful,  almost  at  once  was 
recognized  as  a  well-graced,  promising  actress, 
says  much  not  only  for  her  native  ability,  but 
also  for  the  quality  and  thoroughness  of  the 
training  that  took  place  in  the  interim. 

Miss  Dow4  took  an  apartment  on  Thirty- 

*  Miss  Dow  was  for  many  years  known  as  the  aunt  of 
Miss  Marlowe.  There  was  no  actual  relationship;  but  by 


JULIA  MARLOWE  303 

sixth  Street  and  a  house  in  Bayonne,  New  Jer- 
sey. In  these  places — and  especially  at  Bayonne 
— the  girl's  studies  were  prosecuted  with  the 
greatest  faithfulness  for  something  over  three 
years.  There  is  not  the  least  doubt  that  Miss 
Marlowe,  during  this  period  of  tutelage,  worked 
hard  to  deserve  her  later  success.  Five  parts  5 
were  selected  from  the  "  classic )r  repertoire  of 
the  day  and  were  studied  assiduously.  The 
pupil  learned  the  cardinal  principle  of  leaving 
no  dramatic  effort  to  chance, — of  knowing  a 
part  so  thoroughly  well  that  it  can  be  rendered 
with  a  confidence  in  all  the  gestures  and  tones 
to  be  employed.  So  well  indeed  was  this 
groundwork  laid  that  it  probably  had  its  last- 
ing effect  on  the  actress's  art.  It  has  been  the 
commonplace  criticism  of  Miss  Marlowe  that 
she  lacks  the  note  of  spontaneity,  that  there  is 
evidence  of  premeditation  in  all  she  does. 

legal  agreement  or  otherwise  Miss  Marlowe  was  an 
"adopted  niece"  of  the  older  woman.  Miss  Bow's  interest 
in  her  young  charge  was,  naturally,  not  wholly  altruistic. 
That  is,  there  was  a  signed  agreement  by  virtue  of  which 
Miss  Dow  was  to  share  heavily  in  any  earnings  of  Miss 
Marlowe  for  a  term  of  years  after  the  de"but,  and  was  to 
have  a  voice  in  the  management  of  her  affairs.  After  the 
actress*  emergence  in  1887  as  Julia  Marlowe,  however,  Miss 
Bow's  management  continued  for  only  a  few  years.  There 
was  even  newspaper  talk  of  Miss  Marlowe's  having  "thrown 
over"  her  guide  and  friend,  after  she  began  to  meet  success. 
Miss  Bow  became  Mrs.  Currier.  Her  training  of  Fanny 
Brough  started  her  on  a  long  career  as  a  dramatic  teacher, 
in  which  capacity  she  was  active  as  recently  as  the  autumn 
of  1915. 

s  Juliet  in  Romeo  and  Juliet,  Julia  in  The  Hunchback, 
Parthenia  in  Ingomar,  Pauline  in  The  Lady  of  Lyons  and 
Galatea  in  Pygmalion  and  Galatea. 


304      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

"One  would  not  urge,"  said  the  Evening 
Standard  when  she  went  to  London  in  1907, 
'  *  that  the  outstanding  feature  of  her  art  is  that 
it  is  art  concealed. ' ' 

"I  never  needed  the  spur,"  Miss  Marlowe 
has  said  of  her  days  as  Miss  Dow's  pupil. 
"The  aim  of  my  instructors  should  have  been, 
perhaps,  to  keep  me  from  working  too  hard. 
Nobody  deluded  me  with  the  assurance  that  I 
was  a  genius.  Indeed  the  contrary  impression 
was  steadfastly  enforced,  and  I  secretly  de- 
cided that  I  might  make  myself  a  genius  if  I 
only  worked  hard  enough." 

Besides  the  minute  study  of  particular  roles, 
her  tasks  included  music,  dancing,  gymnastic 
exercises,  the  history  and  literature  of  the 
drama,  and,  under  the  teaching  of  a  singing 
master,  much  practice  in  voice  development. 
The  utmost  care  was  taken  in  matters  of  car- 
riage and  " stage  deportment."6 

Miss  Dow's  pupil  endured  the  rigors  of  this 
training  until  the  spring  of  1887.  Now,  it  was 
thought,  the  young  actress  was  ready  to  bid 
for  the  public's  notice.  It  was  the  fixed  idea  of 
both  the  pupil  and  her  teacher  that  she  would 
appear  only  as  a  "star"  and  only  in  "classic" 

«  "Whole  plays  were  rehearsed.  The  instructor  served  both 
as  audience  and  prompter.  She  read  all  the  parts  save  the 
heroine's.  Scenery  and  the  position  of  the  other  players  were 
indicated  by  tables  and  chairs.  When  Romeo  and  Juliet  was 
rehearsed,  the  back  of  a  venerable  haircloth  sofa  was  the 
balcony  rail.  With  her  chin  resting  upon  it  and  her  gaze 
fixed  tenderly  upon  a  worn  place  in  the  carpet,  she  first  re- 
cited Juliet's  impassioned  good-night  to  her  lover." 


JULIA  MARLOWE  305 

plays.  It  was  but  natural  that  managers  were 
slow  to  place  so  much  confidence  in  an  untried 
actress.  Months  passed,  and  no  manager  could 
be  found  to  take  her  at  her  own  valuation. 
What  would  have  been  considered  by  many  a 
good  actress  attractive  offers  she  repeatedly 
declined.  Finally  it  was  again  Colonel  Miles 
who  became  her  patron,  as  he  had  been  years 
before.  A  company  was  organized,  and  the 
erstwhile  Fanny  Brough,  bearing  now  her  new 
name,  made  a  brief  tour  (April  and  May, 
1887)  in  Connecticut,  playing  Parthenia,  Gala- 
tea and  Pauline.  The  opening  performance 
was  in  New  London  on  April  27.  She  played 
Ingomar,  and  the  next  day's  local  paper  said 
that  she  was  a  genius  and  would  "yet  wear  a 
crown  of  diamonds. "  Pleasing  as  this  praise 
may  have  been  to  Miss  Marlowe,  the  truth  is 
that  the  brief  tour  was  insignificant,  and  that 
not  the  slightest  ripple  was  caused  in  the  great 
centers  by  her  debut  in  "the  provinces." 

The  real  beginning  of  Julia  Marlowe 's  career 
came  the  following  October 7  when,  still  under 
Colonel  Miles'  management,  she  gave  a  single 
matinee  performance  of  Ingomar  at  the  Bijou 
Theatre  in  New  York.  "Every  one  but  me," 

7  On  the  twentieth.  How  old  was  Julia  Marlowe  on  this 
important  day  of  her  life?  The  date  of  her  birth  has  been 
variously  given,  and  authority  might  be  found  for  any  year 
between  1864  and  1870.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  Register  of 
Baptisms  of  the  Parish  of  Caldbeck  shows  that  she  was  bap- 
tized September  23,  1866.  Thus  she  was  at  least  twenty-one 
at  the  time  of  her  debut,  though  she  was  popularly  supposed 
to  be  about  eighteen. 


306      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

says  Miss  Dow,  "had  lost  confidence  in  her. 
Mr.  Miles  asked  me  in  trembling  tones  if  I  real- 
ized what  it  would  mean  if  she  were  a  failure. 
Julia  had  been  in  such  a  state  of  fright  for  a 
few  days  before  the  performance  that  she  lost 
her  voice  temporarily.  When  the  curtain  rose 
on  her  debut  she  talked  so  low  for  a  time  that 
no  one  could  hear  her.  Then  I  said  from  the 
wings,  'Julia,  if  you  don't  speak  up,  I'll  come 
out  on  the  stage  to  you.'  She  grew  angry  at 
this,  and  from  then  on  everything  went 
smoothly.  At  the  end  of  the  first  act  there  was 
a  silence  for  a  long  enough  time  for  her  to  get 
to  her  dressing  room.  Then  the  house  burst 
into  a  storm  of  applause  and  she  was  called  be- 
fore the  curtain  again  and  again. " 

The  town  had  paid  her  compliment  of  curi- 
osity, the  critics  were  more  enthusiastic  than 
could  have  been  hoped,  and  the  managers  made 
her  various  offers,  which  she  consistently  re- 
fused; all  of  which  constituted  a  successful 
debut  for  an  actress  new  to  important  parts. 
She  was  virtually  beginning  her  career  at  the 
top,  in  America's  theatrical  capital, — a  course 
involving  courage  and  a  high-minded  disre- 
gard of  the  many  short  cuts  to  easily  won  ma- 
terial rewards. 

Julia  Marlowe's  best  publicity  agent  at  this 
time  was  Eobert  G.  Ingersoll.  The  "  great 
agnostic"  had  been  "managed,"  in  his  lecture 
tours,  by  Colonel  Miles'  partner,  and  was  pre- 
vailed upon  to  see  Miss  Marlowe  act.  How- 
ever great  and  good  a  man  he  was,  Colonel 


JULIA  MARLOWE  307 

Ingersoll  was  not  especially  skilled  as  a  dra- 
matic critic.  Still,  such  was  his  influence  that 
his  letters  of  extravagant  praise,  widely  copied 
in  the  press,  did  more  than  any  other  one  thing 
to  fix  her  name  in  the  public  mind.8 

In  December  of  1887  she  followed  the  Octo- 
ber matinee  by  a  week  at  the  Star  Theatre  in 
New  York,  playing  Juliet  and  Viola  as  well  as 
Parthenia,  without  doing  much  either  to  add  to 
or  detract  from  the  earliest  impression.  And 
then,  after  this  week,  came  another  term  of  dis- 
couraging delay.  There  came  renewed  offers 
of  positions  in  support  of  other  stars,  or  in 
plays  not  to  her  liking.  But  she  refused  them, 
and  said  she  would  play  as  a  star,  in  the  ' 'clas- 
sics," or  not  at  all.  Evidently  the  Miles  con- 
tingent about  this  time  lost  some  of  its  enthu- 
siasm, for  it  seems  that  a  six  weeks'  tour  that 
took  her  as  far  as  Cincinnati  was  financed 
by  a  new  backer,  said  to  be  a  Sixth  Avenue 
restauranteur  named  Bristol.  Success  did  not 

s  Besides  other  things,  Colonel  Ingersoll  said:  "To  retain 
the  freshness  that  is  her  greatest  charm  she  will  have  to  ... 
pay  no  attention  to  the  critics.  Her  talent  needs  no  guide 
save  that  afforded  by  her  experience  and  her  own  mentality." 
One  Alfred  Ayres,  writing  to  the  editor  of  the  New  York 
Dramatic  Mirror,  voiced  the  protest  that  was  felt  in  many 
quarters  against  Colonel  Ingersoll's  kindly  meant  over-en- 
thusiasm: "What  nonsense  clever  men  do  sometimes  talk, 
when  they  talk  about  things  they  know  little  or  nothing 
about!  .  .  .  There  is  not  a  novice  in  America  more  in  need 
of  guidance  than  is  Miss  Julia  Marlowe.  To  let  her  go  her 
own  way  would  be  to  let  her  go  to  ruin.  She  is  already 
on  the  high-road  to  becoming  merely  coy,  coddling,  and  goody- 
goody."  Colonel  Ingersoll  became  Miss  Marlowe's  personal 
friend.  At  least  one  summer  she  spent  with  his  family. 


308      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

yet  alight  on  the  Marlowe  banner,  however,  and 
Mr.  Bristol  lost  his  five  thousand  dollars. 

Financial  success,  indeed,  was  slow  in  com- 
ing to  Miss  Marlowe,  a  fact  which  may  seem 
curious  to  a  public  that  of  late  years  has  been 
accustomed  to  seeing  the  mere  words  "  Julia 
Marlowe "  and  later  "Sothern  and  Marlowe " 
sufficient  to  fill  any  theatre.  The  restauranteur 
— art  supported  by  oysters! — was  followed  in 
his  part  of  "backer"  by  the  New  York  pho- 
tographer Falk,  who  with  a  supreme  faith  in 
his  star  saw  twenty-five  thousand  dollars  slip 
through  his  fingers  before  a  change  of  manage- 
ment and  the  growing  reputation  of  Miss  Mar- 
lowe turned  the  tide. 

It  was  in  the  fall  of  1888  that  the  American 
public  began  generally  to  be  aware  of  the  pres- 
ence on  its  stage  of  a  new  and  beautiful  actress. 
Mr.  Fred  Stinson  was  now  made  Miss  Mar- 
lowe's manager.  He  was  more  adroit  than 
his  predecessors,  and  engaged  for  her  support 
an  excellent  company  that  included  Charles 
Barren,  who  had  been  leading  man  at  the  Bos- 
ton Museum,  William  Owen,  an  excellent 
Shakespearean  comedian,  Robert  Taber  (who 
later  became  Miss  Marlowe's  husband),  and 
Mary  Shaw.  A  week  was  spent  in  Washing- 
ton, and  then  another  week  in  Brooklyn.  C. 
M.  S.  McLellan,  writing  in  the  New  York  Press 
of  November  25,  1888,  refers  to  her  as  "Julia 
Marlowe,  a  girl  who  played  a  number  of  parts 
in  Brooklyn  last  week."  "She  has  a  tip-tilted 
nose,"  he  goes  on,  "wide,  imploring  eyes,  a 


JULIA  MARLOWE  309 

slender  shape  buoyant  with  health  and  youth, 
a  songful  voice,  and  the  accidental  movements 
of  an  innocent.  .  .  .  She  is  now  an  artiste, 
in  sweet  embryo.  ...  It  is  the  apparent  pli- 
ancy of  Julia  Marlowe,  both  mental  and  phys- 
ical, which  makes  you  admire  her  now.  It 
also  makes  you  wonder  what  her  fate  is  to 
be." 

The  first  genuine  triumph  of  her  career  came 
to  Miss  Marlowe  when  she  reached  Boston. 
Her  week  at  the  Hollis  Street  Theatre  in  De- 
cember, 1888,  was  the  first  completely  reassur- 
ing experience  of  her  career,  for  there,  for  the 
first  time,  did  she  win  the  genuinely  enthusi- 
astic response  of  public  and  critics.  In  Phila- 
delphia, too,  and  in  Baltimore,  and  Chicago,  she 
found  a  cordial  welcome.  Her  ambitions  were 
beginning  to  be  realized,  Miss  Dow's  labors 
justified,  and  Mr.  Falk's  coffers  were  once  more 
filled. 

A  correspondent  of  the  Boston  Herald,  writ- 
ing from  Brooklyn  in  1888,  gives  his  impres- 
sions of  the  rising  "star":  "Anything  more 
unlike  than  this  young  girl  off  the  stage  [he 
had  been  'an  audience  of  one  in  assisting  at 
her  Thanksgiving  repast,  which  was  hurriedly 
swallowed  between  matinee  and  evening  per- 
formances'] and  as  the  character  she  repre- 
sents before  the  footlights  I  have  seldom  seen. 
It  is  as  though  she  were  two  distinct  individu- 
als, bearing  absolutely  no  relation  in  manner, 
face,  figure,  temperament  or  intelligence  to 
each  other.  Away  from  the  footlights,  and  di- 


310      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

vested  of  the  role  she  personates,  Miss  Mar- 
lowe is  a  frank,  girlish  young  woman,  almost 
awkward  in  her  movements, .  and  shy  and  re- 
tiring to  excess  in  manner  and  speech.  There 
are  times  when  she  seems  almost  plain  and 
again  one  is  surprised  into  thinking  her  abso- 
lutely beautiful.  .  .  .  She  is  not  at  all  asser- 
tive; on  the  contrary,  she  impresses  one  as  a 
person  who  would  never  force  herself  into  any 
prominence.  This  is  Miss  Marlowe  off  the 
stage. 

"On  the  stage?  Well,  I  had  a  mental  shock 
when  I  saw  her  as  Parthenia.  It  was  like  a 
transformation  scene,  and  so  complete  that  I 
almost  failed  to  recognize  the  actress  as  the 
same  shy,  unformed  girl  I  had  been  chatting 
with.  Is  she  a  great  actress?  Decidedly,  no. 
But  I  would  wager  a  good  deal  that  the  day  is 
not  far  distant  when  she  will  be  hailed  as 
such. ' ' 

Successful  as  she  began  now  to  be  in  other 
cities,  she  did  not  at  once  win  as  much  favor  in 
New  York.  It  took  her  ten  years  to  become  as 
popular  in  the  metropolis  as  she  was  in  "the 
provinces."  Taking  a  general  view  of  Miss 
Marlowe's  career  it  would  seem  that  her  con- 
quest of  New  York  coincided  fairly  accurately 
with  her  modification  of  her  early  ideals  as  to 
playing  nothing  but  the  "classic"  parts,  for, 
lying  between  the  period  of  which  we  have 
been  speaking  and  the  later  ' '  Sothern  and  Mar- 
lowe" campaign  with  Shakespeare,  there  were 
some  years  (roughly  from  1897  to  1904)  when 


JULIA  MARLOWE  311 

the  "  classics "  were  pretty  well  abandoned.9 
The  first  change  in  the  hitherto  carefully 
guarded  repertory  came  in  1894,  when  she  was 
married  to  her  "leading  man,"  Robert  Taber. 
With  a  self-subordination  rare  enough  among 
newly-fledged  "stars"  she  saw  herself  taking, 
at  times,  inferior  and  sometimes  quite  unsuited 
parts  in  plays  produced  primarily  for  the  sake 
of  Mr.  Taber.  The  worst  instance  was  Henry 
IV ',  in  which  Mr.  Taber  was  an  admirable  Hot- 
spur and  Miss  Marlowe  a  Prince  Hal  who  was 
hopelessly  at  variance  with  the  ideal  of  the 
part.10  At  this  time  she  was  known  as  "Julia 

»  Beginning  with  her  New  York  d6but  in  1887,  Julia  Mar- 
lowe's first  appearances  in  her  various  parts  were  as  follows: 
Parthenia  in  Ingomar,  Juliet  in  Romeo  and  Juliet,  Viola 
in  Twelfth  Night,  1887;  Julia  in  The  Hunchback,  Pauline  in 
The  Lady  of  Lyons,  1888;  Rosalind  in  As  You  Like  It,  Galatea 
in  Pygmalion  and  Galatea,  1889;  Beatrice  in  Much  Ado  About 
Nothing,  1890;  Imogen  in  Cymbeline,  Charles  Hart  in  Rogues 
and  Vagabonds,  1891;  Constance  in  The  Love  Chase,  1893;  Le- 
titia  Hardy  in  The  Belle's  Stratagem,  Chatterton  in  Chatter- 
ton,  Lady  Teazle  in  The  School  for  Scandal,  1894;  Coloinbe  in 
Colombe's  Birthday,  Prince  Hal  in  Henry  IV,  Kate  Hardcastle 
in  She  Stoops  to  Conquer,  1895;  Lydia  Languish  in  The 
Rivals  (supplementary  spring  season,  with  "all-star  cast"), 
Romola  in  Romola,  1896;  Mary  in  For  Bonnie  Prince  Charlie, 
The  Countess  in  The  Countess  Valeska,  1897;  Colinette  in 
Colinette,  Barbara  in  Barbara  Frietchie,  1899 ;  Mary  Tudor  in 
When  Knighthood  Was  in  Flower,  1901;  Fiametta  in  The 
Queen  Fiametta,  Charlotte  Oliver  in  The  Cavalier,  1902;  Lady 
Barchester  in  Fools  of  Nature,  1903;  Ophelia  in  Hamlet,  1904; 
Katherine  in  The  Taming  of  the  Shrew,  Portia  in  The  Mer- 
chant of  Venice,  1905;  Salome  in  John  the  Baptist,  Jeanne  in 
Jeanne  tfArc,  Rautendelein  in  The  Sunken  Bell,  1906;  Ma- 
donna Gloria  in  Gloria,  Yvette  in  The  Goddess  of  Reason, 
1908;  Cleopatra  in  Antony  and  Cleopatra,  1909;  Lady  Mac- 
beth in  Macbeth,  1910. 

10  For  Henry  IV  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Taber  had  to  learn  to  wear 


312      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Marlowe  Taber,"  but  the  change  involved  some 
sacrifice,  for,  by  1894,  the  name  "  Julia  Mar- 
lowe "  had  a  definite  value  and  the  public  did 
not  respond  enthusiastically  to  the  new  order 
of  things.  It  is  a  theatrical  axiom  that  the 
public  does  not  like  to  see  man  and  wife  acting 
together.  One  manager11  brought  suit  be- 
cause, having  contracted  for  "  Julia  Marlowe," 
he  got  "Mr.  and  Mrs.  Eobert  Taber."  It  has 
been  said  that  Frederick  Stinson,  the  manager 
who  had  labored  for  years  to  develop  the 
prestige  that  attached  to  Miss  Marlowe's  name, 
aged  visibly  when  his  work  was  so  rapidly  un- 
done. 

The  artistic  coalition  that  was  thought  would 
be  the  result  of  the  marriage  turned  out 
a  comparative  failure.  Unfortunately  a  per- 
sonal element  that  proved  anything  but  help- 
ful entered  the  situation.  Mr.  Taber  was  a 
skilled  actor  of  a  rather  hard  style — but  the 
printed  criticisms  of  their  productions  often 
brought  more  praise  to  Mrs.  Taber  than  to  him, 
— naturally  enough,  as  she  was  the  better  art- 
ist. His  resentment  at  his  comparative  artistic 
failure  went  to  such  lengths  that  he  quarreled 
with  his  wife,  and,  after  three  seasons  of  mar- 
ried joint-stardom  they  went  their  separate 
ways:  Taber  to  London  to  act  with  Irving, 
and  his  wife,  after  a  meeting  in  France,  and 
an  ineffectual  effort  on  her  part  to  effect  a 

armor.     They  used  genuine  armor,  and  to  accustom  themselves 
to  it  they  wore  it  for  hours  each  day  in  their  apartments. 
11  Frank  Howe,  of  the  Walnut  Street  Theatre,  Philadelphia. 


JULIA  MARLOWE  313 

reconciliation,  to  America  to  resume  her  career 
as  Julia  Marlowe.12 

A  survey  of  the  plays  the  Tabers  gave  to- 
gether from  1894  to  1897  does  not  show  that 
the  public  was  warranted,  from  any  lack  of 
their  adherence  to  the  Marlowe  standard  of 
play,  in  withholding  its  former  allegiance. 
There  was,  to  be  sure,  the  mistake,  Henry  IV. 
Mrs.  Taber  was,  moreover,  a  comparative  fail- 
ure as  Mrs.  Hardcastle  and  as  Lydia  Languish 
— for  her  forte  was  not  eighteenth  century  com- 
edy— and  Romola  afforded  scarcely  any  oppor- 
tunities for  her,  while  Mr.  Taber 's  Tito  had  a 
great  success.  But  all  of  these  plays  excepting 
Henri/  IV  were  really  incidental,  and  at  differ- 
ent times  during  these  three  years  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Taber  were  playing  a  number  of  the  old  Julia 
Marlowe  successes :  Romeo  and  Juliet,  Twelfth 
Night,  As  You  Like  It,  Much  Ado,  Ingomar, 
Pygmalion  and  Galatea,  The  Hunchback,  and 
The  Lady  of  Lyons. 

It  was  not  until  1897,  when  the  separation 
had  taken  place  and  Miss  Marlowe  had  placed 
herself  under  the  management  of  C.  B.  Dilling- 
ham,  associated  with  Charles  Frohman,  that 
her  period  of  artistic  eclipse,  and  of  great  com- 
mercial prosperity,  began.  At  the  dictation 
of  her  new  management,  she  abandoned  almost 
altogether  the  heroines  of  poetic  drama,  and 

12  She  obtained  a  divorce  in  January,  1900.  Four  years 
later  Taber  died,  of  tuberculosis,  "at  a  refuge  in  the  Adiron- 
dack Mountains,  provided  for  him, — for  he  had  been  rendered 
practically  destitute  by  illness — through  the  goodness  of  his 
former  wife."  (Winter.) 


314      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

began  a  seven-year  term  in  the  service  of  the 
dramatized  novel  and  the  quickly  forgotten 
modern  ephemeral  play.  The  Countess  Va- 
leska,  Colinette,  Barbara  Frietchie,  When 
Knighthood  Was  in  Flower,  and  The  Cavalier 
make  rather  a  sorry  showing  when  compared 
with  most  of  the  list  just  given.  She  was  made 
at  last  a  successful  "star"  in  New  York,18  but, 
as  John  Corbin  wrote  at  the  close  of  this  period 
of  eclipse,  she  was  " mourned  by  the  'road'  [i. 
e.,  the  country  outside  New  York]  as  the  living 
tomb  of  a  youth  of  abundant  promise." 

Of  these  plays  of  the  interregnum  it  is  curi- 
ously true  that  those  least  entitled  to  serious 
consideration  as  drama,  Barbara  Frietchie  and 
When  Knighthood  Was  in  Flower,  were  the 
most  successful  in  advancing  Miss  Marlowe  to 
the  heights  of  popularity.  Colinette — which 
was  adapted  from  a  French  play — and  The 
Countess  Valeska — from  the  German — were 
both  justified  as  skillfully  written  romantic 
dramas,  of  much  strength  and  charm,  if  not  of 
permanent  value.  Barbara  Frietchie  and 
When  Knighthood  Was  in  Flower,  however, 
were  highly  artificial,  thin,  pseudo-historical 
dramas,  one  dealing  with  the  heroine  of  Whit- 
tier's  poem — the  play  was  by  the  prolific  Clyde 
Fitch — and  the  other  a  fictional  episode  in  the 
life  of  Mary  Tudor,  the  sister  of  Henry  VIII. 

is  In  the  season  of  1895-96  during  the  "Mr.  and  Mrs.  Taber" 
period,  they  had  played  with  some  success  at  Wallack's,  prac- 
tically her  first  down-town  engagement  since  the  d£but  in  1887. 
It  was  during  this  engagement  that  William  Dean  Howells 
wrote  enthusiastic  praise  of  her  Juliet. 


JULIA  MARLOWE  315 

Miss  Marlowe's  sincerest  admirers  deeply  re- 
gretted the  time  and  energy  she  spent,  year 
after  year,  on  these  and  like  plays;  but  they 
often  asserted  that  her  acting  transformed  and 
beautified  the  material  with  which  she  worked. 
As  Colinette,  according  to  Mr.  Winter,  she 
"gave  a  performance  of  singular  flexibility 
and  of  exceptionally  artistic  grace,  such  as  not 
only  pleases  while  passing  but  leaves  in  the 
memory  an  ideal  of  noble  and  lovable  woman- 
hood, " — strong  and  partial  words,  but  indica- 
tive of  the  glamour  Miss  Marlowe  has  thrown 
over  inferior  plays.  "Her  utterance  of  Bar- 
bara's appeal  to  her  father  for  her  wounded 
lover's  life,"  says  Mr.  Winter  of  her  acting  in 
Mr.  Pitch's  play,  "was  spoken  with  exquisite 
beauty,  and  her  expression  of  the  frenzy  of 
grief,  on  finding  him  dead,  reached  as  great  a 
height  as  is  possible  to  spoken  pathos." 

As  for  When  Knighthood  Was  in  Flower,  an 
English  critic  later  said:  "There  is  a  certain 
lilt  and  go,  a  touch  of  nature  among  the  fool's 
fabric  of  the  melodrama,  which  set  her  far 
above  our  steady  practitioners  in  the  same  act 
of  sinking.  And,  above  all,  a  sense  of  parody 
pierced  through  words  and  actions,  comment- 
ing wittily  on  the  nonsense  of  romance  which 
so  many  were  so  willing  to  take  seriously.  She 
was  a  live  thing;  defiantly  and  gayly  conscious 
of  every  absurdity  with  which  she  indulged  the 
babyish  tastes  of  one  more  public." 

All  this  playing  in  popular  pieces  of  the  day 
involved  a  certain  amount  of  additional  train- 


316      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

ing  for  the  work  that  was  to  come, — the  third 
and  last  period  of  Marlowe's  work, — the  ten 
years  during  which  she  and  Edward  Sothern 
were  " joint  stars."  She  brought  to  her  new 
work  a  variously  experienced,  thoroughly  dis- 
ciplined art. 

It  sent  something  like  a  thrill  through  that 
large  part  of  the  public  interested  in  the  the- 
atre, when  it  was  announced,  in  the  summer  of 
1904,  that  Julia  Marlowe  and  E.  H.  Sothern 
were  to  act  together  in  Shakespeare.  It  was 
felt  that  the  actress  was  again  coming  into  her 
own.14 

Some  of  her  parts  with  Mr.  Sothern  were  but 
revivifications  of  heroines  of  her  early  career: 
Juliet,  Viola,  Beatrice,  Eosalind ;  others  she  at- 
tempted for  the  first  time  during  one  or  an- 
other of  these  years  from  1904  to  1914 :  Ophe- 
lia, Katherine  the  Shrew,  Lady  Macbeth,  and, 
at  the  inauguration  of  the  ill-fated  New  The- 
atre in  New  York,  Cleopatra  in  Antony  and 
Cleopatra. 

i*  This  memorable  alliance  first  went  into  effect  in  Chicago, 
September  19,  1904,  at  the  Illinois  Theatre.  It  continued  for 
three  seasons,  after  which,  during  the  seasons  of  1907-8  and 
1908-9,  each  again  headed  separate  companies.  In  1909  they 
rejoined  forces,  and  continued  to  act  together  until  the  spring 
of  1914,  when  Miss  Marlowe  was  taken  sick,  and  Mr.  Sothern 
continued  alone.  At  this  time  it  was  announced  that  Miss 
Marlowe  had  retired  from  the  stage  for  good.  There  was 
subsequently  some  talk  of  a  farewell  tour,  but  Miss  Marlowe's 
retirement  was  definitely  confirmed  in  the  summer  of  1915. 
As  everyone  knows,  the  two  stars  became  man  and  wife.  The 
marriage  occurred  in  London,  in  1911. 


JULIA  MARLOWE  317 

The  American  public,  whatever  its  expecta- 
tions in  1904,  has  since  come  to  take  a  rather 
complacent  view  of  its  privilege  in  seeing  Miss 
Marlowe  and  Mr.  Sothern  act  Shakespeare 
together.  They  have  been  financially  ex- 
tremely successful.  Several  other  attempts 
during  this  period  to  popularize  Shakespeare 
in  America  (and  some  of  them  were  " pro- 
duced "  and  acted  in  a  manner  to  make  them  fit 
rivals)  have  struggled  through  brief  and  only 
moderately  well  supported  existences;  while 
Sothern  and  Marlowe  have  gone  on  for  the  best 
part  of  ten  years,  drawing  crowded  houses. 
Yet  many  an  old  time  playgoer,  who  has  fol- 
lowed Julia  Marlowe's  career  since  its  begin- 
nings, will  tell  you  that  nothing  she  has  done 
since  has  quite  equaled,  in  the  combined  ap- 
peal of  its  fresh  youth,  its  varied  beauty,  and 
its  unforced  poetic  moods,  the  acting  of  the 
Julia  Marlowe  of  early  days. 

The  summer  of  1906  Miss  Marlowe  spent — 
as  she  has  many  others — in  Europe.  One  of 
the  places  she  visited  was  the  birthplace  of 
Jeanne  d'Arc,  for  she  was  contemplating  the 
production  of  Percy  MacKaye's  play  concern- 
ing the  Maid.  When  she  returned  to  America, 
she  and  Mr.  Sothern  dissolved  their  association 
with  the  Frohman  side  of  the  theatrical  house, 
and  went  over  to  the  Shuberts.  There  followed 
the  production  of  a  group  of  plays  new  to  her 
experience,  John  the  Baptist,  by  Sudermann,  in 
which  she  played  Salome,  The  Sunken  Bell,  by 


318      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Hauptmann,  a  piece  retained  from  Mr.  Soth- 
ern's  earlier  repertoire,  and  Jeanne  d'Arc. 

It  was  with  the  last  two  plays,  and  with 
Romeo  and  Juliet,  Hamlet,  As  You  Like  It, 
When  Knighthood  Was  in  Flower,  and  Twelfth 
Night,  that  Miss  Marlowe  ventured  for  the  first 
time  to  appear  in  London,  in  the  spring  of  1907. 
The  success  of  the  Sothern  and  Marlowe  en- 
gagement at  the  Waldorf  Theatre  hung  at  first 
in  the  balance,  for  the  first  play  presented  was 
The  Sunken  Bell,  which  failed  to  appeal  to 
London.  As  for  Miss  Marlowe  as  Bautende- 
lein,  she  was  dismissed  by  Mr.  Walkley  in  The 
Times  as  showing  the  grace  and  elfishness  and 
charm  of  the  character;  "but  she  was  not,"  he 
continued,  " exactly  a  frisky  fairy." 

The  tide  turned  with  Miss  Marlowe's  Viola, 
and,  somewhat  to  the  surprise  of  his  followers 
at  home,  with  Mr.  Sothern 's  Hamlet,  which  was 
hailed  as  a  distinguished  achievement. 

One  English  writer,  Arthur  Symons,  quite 
lost  his  head  in  admiration  of  the  American 
visitors.  "We  have  not  in  our  whole  island," 
he  wrote,  "two  actors  capable  of  giving  so  se- 
rious, so  intelligent,  so  carefully  finished,  so 
vital  an  interpretation  of  Shakespeare,  or  in- 
deed of  rendering  any  form  of  poetic  drama  on 
the  stage."  Berbohm  Tree  gave  them  a  sup- 
per at  His  Majesty's;  Mr.  Asquith  was  there, 
a  prince  or  two,  and,  more  to  the  point,  a  rep- 
resentative group  of  England's  stage  workers. 
"There  is  danger,"  said  The  Evening  Stand- 
ard when  she  played  Viola,  "of  our  all  becom- 


JULIA  MARLOWE  319 

ing  Marlowe  worshipers  if  she  goes  on  like 
this."15 

Though  the  London  critics  appraised  Mr. 
Sothern's  Hamlet  higher  than  American  re- 
viewers ever  did,  and  though  the  newspaper 
comment  on  each  play  was  favorable,  except  on 
The  Sunken  Bell  and  When  Knighthood  Was  m 
Flower,  the  London  public  did  not  attend  in 
great  numbers. 

Still,  the  English  tour  may  be  said  to  mark 
the  apex  of  the  career  of  both  artists.  When 
they  returned  home  each  was  for  a  time  again 
an  independent  "star."  When  the  ambi- 
tiously planned  New  Theatre,  in  New  York, 
opened  its  doors  for  what  was  fondly  hoped 

IB  Mr.  Walkley  wrote  in  The  Times  an  eloquent  tribute  to 
her  Viola,  which  he  found  "bewitching."  "In  the  purely  sensu- 
ous element  in  Shakespeare,  in  the  poet's  picture  of  frankly 
joyous  and  full-blooded  womanhood,  the  actress  is  in  her  ele- 
ment, mistress  of  her  part,  revelling  in  it  and  swaying  the 
audience  by  an  irresistible  charm.  She  aims  at  no  startling 
'effects' ;  she  seems  to  be  simply  herself — herself,  that  is,  glori- 
fied by  the  romance  of  the  part — enjoying  the  moment  for  the 
moment's  sake,  and  so  making  the  moment  a  sheer  enjoyment 
for  the  spectator.  That  is  now  clearly  shown  which  in  her 
earlier  parts  could  only  be  divined — that  here  is  a  genuine  in- 
dividuality, a  temperament  of  real  force  and  peculiar  charm. 
High-arched  brows  over  wide-open,  eloquent  eyes;  a  most  ex- 
pressive mouth,  now  roguish  with  mischief,  now  trembling  with 
passion ;  a  voice  with  a  strange  croon  in  it,  with  sudden  breaks 
and  sobs — these,  of  course,  are  purely  physical  qualifications 
which  an  actress  might  have  and  yet  not  greatly  move  us. 
But  behind  these  things  in  Miss  Marlowe  there  is  evidently 
an  alert  intelligence,  a  rare  sense  of  humor  and  a  nervous 
energy  which  make,  with  her  more  external  qualities,  a  com- 
bination really  fine.  She  beguiled  not  only  Olivia,  but  the 
whole  house  to  admiration.  Here,  then,  is  one  of  Shakespeare's 
true  women." 


320      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

would  be  the  dawn  of  a  new  era  in  the  Ameri- 
can theatre,  Miss  Marlowe  and  Mr.  Sothern 
were  the  leading  members  of  a  cast  assembled 
to  perform  Antony  and  Cleopatra.  The  pro- 
duction pleased  neither  public  nor  critics,  and 
it  cannot  be  said  that  Miss  Marlowe  will  be 
remembered  chiefly  for  her  Cleopatra.  Since 
then  "Sothern  and  Marlowe"  have  again  car- 
ried Shakespeare  up  and  down  the  country. 

Why  is  it  that  the  public,  loyal  as  it  has  been 
to  them,  has  taken  their  untiring  campaign  in 
fostering  the  Shakespeare  tradition  so  much  as 
a  matter  of  course?  Perhaps  it  is  because 
nearly  everyone  speaking  English  now  takes 
Shakespeare  himself  as  a  matter  of  course,  to 
be  accepted,  like  starlight  and  the  blessings  of 
a  free  government,  with  unenthusiastic  com- 
placence, and  because  Miss  Marlowe  herself  is 
so  utterly  Shakespearean.  For  everything  she 
has  done  has  had  a  Shakespearean  tinge.  "She 
was  so  infinitely  more  charming  [as  Mary 
Tudor]  than  the  play  justified  her  in  being," 
someone  once  wrote.  "She  looked  exactly  as 
she  would  have  looked  had  the  play  been 
Shakespeare's." 

"Those  of  us  who  saw  her  as  the  Queen 
Fiametta  remember  well  how  incongruously 
like  Hermione  she  looked  and  was.  When  Miss 
Marlowe  played  Colombe  in  Colombe's  Birth- 
day she  seemed  to  forget  that  she  was  not  play- 
ing Eosalind.  And  even  in  Mr.  Esmond's  dis- 
tinctly modern  drama,  Fools  of  Nature,  Miss 
Marlowe  to  more  than  one  spectator  suggested 


JULIA  MARLOWE  321 

the  England  of  Shakespeare's  day  oftener  than 
the  England  of  to-day. "  16  As  for  Shake- 
speare's plays  themselves:  Her  Viola,  both  of 
the  early  days  and  of  the  later  period,  was  so 
lovely  an  embodiment  of  the  poet's  ideal  that 
he  himself  would  have  been  satisfied  with  it; 
her  Juliet,  her  Beatrice,  her  Rosalind,  all  in 
more  or  less  degree,  were  filled  with  the  pecul- 
iarly Shakespearean  spirit,  the  radiant  sweet- 
ness and  vitality  of  his  women. 

There  is  abroad  among  the  theatregoers  of 
America  a  peculiar,  almost  personal  affection 
for  Miss  Marlowe,  which  is  not  inconsistent 
with  the  complacent  feeling  of  which  we  have 
spoken.  There  is  about  Marlowe  none  of  the 
overpowering  sense  of  riding  the  whirlwind 
that  has  accompanied  Bernhardt  in  her  royal 
progresses  about  the  planet;  she  has  none  of 
the  picturesque  ebullience  of  a  Terry,  nor  even 
the  specialized  appeal  of  Maude  Adams.  She 
has  been  a  happy  "  combination  of  the  poetic- 
ally ideal  and  the  humanly  real"  that  wins,  for 
a  beautiful  and  skillful  actress,  a  position  in 
the  popular  heart,  even  if  it  does  not  take  her, 
because  of  more  or  less  extraneous  character- 
istics, into  the  front  rank  of  "personages." 

Miss  Marlowe,  in  her  quoted  utterances,  has 
occasionally  thrown  light  on  her  attitude  to- 
ward her  own  work  and  toward  her  profession : 

"I  wish  they  wouldn't  confound  me  so  much 
with  the  parts  I  play  and  imagine  I  must  be 

is  Elizabeth  McCracken. 


322      HEROINES  OP  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

playing  my  own  emotions  because  I  give  the 
part  I  am  playing  an  air  of  reality/' 

"It  isn't  the  rewards  that  one  works  for;17 
we  work  because  we  have  to,  because  we  can't 
stop.  Except  for  a  shallow  or  vain  nature 
there  is  nothing  in  the  rewards 'of  this  profes- 
sion commensurate  with  its  pains;  but  in  the 
very  labor  of  it  there's  joy,  if  you're  born  to 
know  it,  that  nothing  else  can  approximate  for 
you." 

Those  who  have  known  Miss  Marlowe  in  her 
own  person  say  that  the  simplicity  and  the 
good  taste  observable  in  her  work  as  an  actress 
find  a  counterpart  in  her  life  off  the  stage.  The 
home  she  maintained  for  years  at  Highmount 
in  the  Catskills  was  a  quiet  retreat  where  she 
enjoyed  the  outdoors,  her  books,  and  the  so- 
ciety of  a  group  of  friends,  most  of  whom  were 
not  personages  known  to  the  theatregoing  pub- 
lic. Her  liking  for  books,  which  is  said  to  be 
keen,  induced  her  not  only  to  carry  about  on  her 
travels  hundreds  of  volumes,  but  at  one  time  to 
take  up  seriously  the  study  of  the  mysteries  of 
bookbinding.  One  summer  she  spent  in  Ger- 
many, taking  lessons  in  that  craft,  and  in  her 
library  are  a  number  of  volumes,  illuminated 
and  bound  by  her  own  hands.  She  sings  a  lit- 
tle, plays  the  piano  well,  and  has  a  well- 
grounded  musical  knowledge.  Unlike  many 
another  successful  actress — Mary  Anderson, 

17  One  can  doubt  the  entire  truth  of  this  statement  without 
denying  the  larger  truths  lying  in  her  general  statement. 


JULIA  MARLOWE  323 

for  instance — she  retained  her  early  strong 
love  for  her  profession. 

"The  rarest  quality  of  Miss  Marlowe's  art," 
says  Elizabeth  McCracken,  one  of  Miss  Mar- 
lowe's closest  friends,  with  what  is  probably 
true  insight,  "is  its  lovely  youthfulness.  Her 
mirth  is  utterly  young;  at  its  gayest,  it  is  tinged 
by  a  certain  wistful  gravity.  Her  woe  is 
young,  too ;  at  its  saddest,  no  drop  of  bitterness 
stains  it.  Children  instinctively  accept  her  as 
a  kindred  spirit,  someone  not  so  different  from 
themselves  as  most  grown-ups." 

Add  to  this  engaging  youthfulness — another 
name,  perhaps,  for  her  sense  of  poetry — her 
dark  and  buoyant  beauty,  her  rich  voice  that 
lent  its  own  music  to  Shakespeare's,  and  you 
have  Julia  Marlowe,  not  a  genius,  certainly,  but 
one  of  America's  gracious  women,  who  has 
brought  beauty  in  many  forms  to  the  American 
stage  in  a  period  when,  but  for  her,  it  had  been 
sadly  lacking. 


MAUDE  ADAMS 

TO  say  that  she  is  the  most  valuable  piece  of 
theatrical  property  in  the  country  is  a 
brutally  commercial  way  to  speak  of  an  artist ; 
but  that  is  the  familiar  and  true,  if  one-sided, 
estimate  of  Maude  Adams.  From  a  small 
career,  notable  in  its  way,  as  a  child  actress, 
through  a  girlhood  that  had  its  struggles  and 
trials,  to  an  early  share  of  success  and  then 
to  an  amazing  degree  of  affectionate  popu- 
larity, a  popularity  far  exceeding  that  of 
greater  artists,  has  been  her  record.  The  mere 
announcement  of  her  name,  without  respect  to 
the  play  she  is  acting,  is  enough  to  fill  any 
theatre  in  the  United  States.  Her  popularity 
is  such  that  it  amounts  almost  to  an  unreason- 
ing worship.  One  can  safely  say  that,  among 
the  women,  at  least,  of  America  there  is  an 
unorganized  Maude  Adams  cult.  And  what- 
ever the  lack  of  proportion  between  this  adu- 
lation and  the  intrinsic  artistic  worth  of  her 
achievements,  it  cannot  be  said  that  Miss 
Adams'  popularity  has  been  unfairly  won. 
She  has  let  her  acting — whatever  its  limitations 
— and  her  variously  expressed  ambitions  speak 
for  themselves,  without  Bernhardtian  adver- 
tising. The  public  knows  her  not  at  all  except 

324 


MAUDE  ADAMS 


MAUDE  ADAMS  325 

as  it  sees  her  across  the  footlights.  She  is  one 
of  the  dignified  women  of  the  theatre. 

Her  mother,  Annie  Adams,  an  actress  well 
known  to  the  passing  generation  of  playgoers, 
was  descended  collaterally  from  the  Presiden- 
tial Adamses  of  Massachusetts.  James  Kis- 
kadden,  the  father  of  Maude  Adams,  * '  a  man  of 
handsome  masculinity, "  at  the  time  of  his 
daughter's  birth  had  come  out  of  the  Middle 
West  to  practice  in  Salt  Lake  City  his  business 
of  banking.1  Annie  Adams  has  been  better 
known  as  the  mother  of  Maude  Adams  than 
as  an  actress  in  her  own  right ;  nevertheless  she 
has  had  a  long  career  as  a  capable  actress. 
When  Maude  was  born  in  Salt  Lake  City,  on 
November  11,  1872,  her  mother  was  a  member 
of  the  local  stock  company. 

The  public  had  not  long  to  wait  for  its  first 
glimpse  of  Maude  Adams.  When  she  was  nine 
months  old  she  was  taken  one  night  to  the  the- 
atre where  her  mother  was  playing.  Accord- 
ing to  the  custom  of  the  day,  the  evening's  en- 
tertainment ended  with  a  short  farce,  this  time 
The  Lost  Child.  In  this  piece  a  baby  is  carried 
on  and  off  the  stage  several  times,  to  be  finally 
carried  in  on  a  platter  and  set  down  before  its 
distracted  father.  The  baby  used  on  this  occa- 
sion was  only  a  month  or  so  old,  and,  as  might 
have  been  expected,  it  began  to  howl  lustily  in 
the  midst  of  its  travels  about  the  stage.  Just 
at  this  moment  Mrs.  Adams,  who  was  not  play- 
ing in  the  second  piece,  was  about  to  leave  the 

i  James  Kiskadden  died  when  Maude  was  ten  years  old. 


326       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

theatre,  when  the  stage  manager  caught  sight 
of  little  Maude.  Miss  Adams '  debut  took  place 
instantly,  for  she  was  placed  on  the  platter  and 
rushed  onto  the  stage  in  place  of  the  howling 
child.  As  the  latter  was  some  eight  months 
the  younger,  the  audience  was  treated  to  the 
unusual  spectacle  of  seeing  a  child  take  on 
twenty  pounds  in  a  few  minutes. 

After  a  while  the  family  moved  to  San  Fran- 
cisco. From  time  to  time  the  little  Maude  ap- 
peared on  the  stage,  although  for  the  most  part 
she  lived  the  life  of  the  ordinary  child.  Her 
glimpses  of  the  life  of  the  stage  were  probably 
more  than  enough,  however,  to  "bend  the 
twig."  Once  her  mother  was  supporting  J.  K. 
Emmett  in  Fritz  in  Ireland.  Mr.  Emmet  had 
seen  Maude  and  wished  to  have  her  play  a 
child's  role  in  this  piece.  Her  father  at  first 
demurred,  as  Maude  was  only  five.  The  child 
was  eager  to  take  the  part,  however,  and  was 
finally  allowed  to  do  so. 

After  another  interval  of  dolls  and  books, 
she  played,  when  about  six,  the  child  in  A  Cele- 
brated Case.  She  learned  her  small  part  so 
well  that  she  had  ample  leisure  to  memorize 
most  of  the  rest  of  the  play.  One  man  in  the 
company,  it  is  said,  was  often  in  her  debt  for 
swift  and  accurate  prompting. 

The  rest  of  her  childhood  was  divided  be- 
tween school — the  Presbyterian  School  for 
Girls  in  Salt  Lake  City — and  occasional  ap- 
pearances on  the  stage.  Her  mother  insisted 
on  the  schooling,  and  Maude  was  bright  enough 


MAUDE  ADAMS  327 

at  her  studies.  But  one  cannot  wonder  that 
the  life  of  the  stage  had  already  enthralled  the 
little  girl.  At  any  rate  she  left  her  books  on 
occasion,  to  play  such  parts  as  Eva  in  Uncle 
Tom's  Cabin,  Paul  in  The  Octoroon,  and  Oliver 
Twist. 

"Little  Maudie  Adams''  came  to  be  the 
first  choice  for  children's  parts  in  the  best  com- 
panies playing  along  the  Pacific  coast.  One 
who  saw  much  of  her  in  those  days,  and  who 
took  pains  to  give  her  much  undoubtedly  valu- 
able instruction,  was  David  Belasco.  "I  was 
the  stage  manager  of  the  Baldwin2  then," 
said  Mr.  Belasco.  "James  A.  Herne  and  I 
were  playing  there  together,  and  in  our  plays 
there  was  usually  a  child's  part.  Annie  Ad- 
ams I  had  known  for  some  years  as  one  of  the 
best  character  actresses  of  the  "West,  but  my 
first  remembrance  of  Maude  Adams  is  of  a  spin- 
dle-legged little  girl,  unusually  thin  and  tall 
for  her  age,  with  a  funny  little  pigtail  and  one 
of  the  quaintest  little  faces  you  ever  saw.  I 
don't  think  even  her  mother  considered  Maudie 
pretty  in  those  days.  But  even  in  her  baby- 
hood there  was  a  magnetism  about  the  child, — 
some  traces  of  that  wonderfully  sweet  and 
charming  personality  which  was  to  prove  such 
a  tremendous  advantage  to  her  in  the  later 
years.  .  .  .  She  could  act  and  grasp  the  mean- 
ing of  a  part  long  before  she  was  able  to  read. 
When  we  were  beginning  rehearsals  of  a  new 

2  In  San  Francisco. 


328       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

play  I  would  take  Maudie  on  my  knee  and  bit 
by  bit  would  explain  to  her  the  meaning  of  the 
part  she  had  to  play.  I  can  see  her  now,  with 
her  little  spindle  legs  almost  touching  the  floor, 
her  tiny  face,  none  too  clean,  perhaps,  peering 
up  into  mine,  and  those  wise  eyes  of  hers  drink- 
ing in  every  word.  I  soon  learned  to  know  that 
it  was  no  use  to  confine  myself  to  a  description 
of  her  own  work :  until  I  had  told  the  whole  story 
of  the  play  to  Maudie,  and  treated  her  almost 
as  seriously  as  if  she  were  our  leading  'star/ 
she  would  pay  no  attention.  She  was  serious- 
minded  in  her  own  childish  way  even  in  those 
days,  and  once  she  realized  that  you  were  treat- 
ing her  seriously  there  was  nothing  that  child 
would  not  try  to  do."3 

One  of  "Little  Maudie  V  successes  at  this 
time  was  in  Chums,  which  Mr.  Belasco  had 
adapted  from  an  old  English  play  The  Mari- 
ner's Compass.  Mr.  Herne,  who  played  in  it 
at  the  time,  later  made  and  acted  in  another 
version,  The  Hearts  of  Oak.  The  character 
Crystal  (for  whom  Mr.  Herne  undoubtedly 
named  his  daughter)  occurs  in  both  versions. 
"From  the  time  Maude  Adams  created  the 
role,"  says  Mr.  Belasco,  "it  became  one  of  the 
most  vital  parts  of  the  play.  Chums,  in  short, 
scored  an  immense  success,  and  'Little  Maudie' 
for  time  being  was  the  heroine  of  the  town." 

Mrs.  Adams  had  seen  to  it  that  Maude  re- 
ceived more  of  the  ordinary  schooling  than 

3  Acton  Davies — Maude  Adams. 


MAUDE  ADAMS  329 

sometimes  falls  to  the  lot  of  a  child  actress. 
When  she  was  thirteen,  however,  her  schooling 
was  called  complete.  The  girl  had  had  her 
taste  of  success  and  during  her  term  at  school 
had  dreamed  of  returning  to  the  stage.  She 
told  her  mother :  '  *  It 's  no  use  my  studying  any 
more,  mother.  ...  I  want  to  go  on  the  stage 
again,  so  that  I  may  be  with  you."  But  when 
the  attempt  was  made  it  proved  to  be  not  the 
easiest  thing  in  the  world.  As  a  child  actress 
of  less  than  ten,  she  had  found  parts  awaiting 
her.  As  a  young  girl  in  her  middle  teens,  parts 
were  much  harder  to  find.  She  traveled  about 
with  her  mother,  getting  an  occasional  small 
part,  such  as  one  of  the  old  women  in  Harbor 
Lights,  or  the  Princess  in  Monte  Christo.  In 
the  meantime,  she  studied  hard,  absorbing  her 
mother's  instructions  and  learning  many  roles. 

When  Miss  Adams  was  just  under  sixteen  she 
and  her  mother  crossed  the  country — in  the 
caste  of  the  melodrama,  The  Paymaster, — to 
try  their  fortunes  in  the  Middle  West  and 
finally  in  New  York.  Although  it  is  on  record 
that  she  won  "a  great  deal  of  praise  for  her 
simplicity  and  beauty,"  one  can  see,  in  the  ac- 
count of  her  nightly  "plunge  into  a  tank  of  real 
water,"4  a  far  cry  to  her  later  distinction  as 
the  interpreter  of  the  subtleties  of  Barrie. 

According  to  thrice-repeated  tales,  which  her 
mother  has  recently  taken  occasion  to  deny,  it 
was  only  after  a  discouraging  period  of  waiting 

*  Part  of  the  time,  at  least,  Mrs.  Adams  substituted  herself 
for  Maude  when  the  time  for  this  plunge  arrived. 


330      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

and  of  fruitless  visits  to  managers,  that  Miss 
Adams  got  her  first  opportunity,  when  The 
Paymaster  had  run  its  course.  A  more  tangi- 
ble tradition  is  to  the  effect  that  while  awaiting 
something  better  Miss  Adams  worked  for  a 
while  as  a  ballet  girl.5  According  to  Mrs. 
Adams,  Maude  had  not  long  been  in  New  York 
when  Daniel  Frohman  offered  her  a  position  in 
the  company  supporting  E.  H.  Sothern.  Vir- 
ginia Harned  took  up  the  cause  of  the  young  ac- 
tress, and  introduced  her  to  Mr.  Sothern.  "I 
must  have  been  a  strangely  unattractive  and 
unclassified  creature  at  the  time,"  says  Miss 
Adams,  "too  young  for  mature  parts  and  too 
old  for  child  impersonations.  Miss  Harned, 
who  had  played  child  parts  with  me,  had  suc- 
ceeded in  interesting  Mr.  Sothern  in  me  and 
one  great  day  I  was  invited  to  dine  with  them 
in  a  public  restaurant.  I  am  sure  that  I  dis- 
gusted Mr.  Sothern  with  my  unconquerable 
bashfulness  and  awkwardness.  Painfully  dif- 
fident, I  scarcely  uttered  a  word  during  the 
whole  of  that  dinner.  Nonetheless  I  was  soon 
afterward  engaged  to  play  in  the  Sothern  com- 
pany."6 

s  "Yes,  I  confess  it,"  she  has  declared,  "I  was  in  the  ballet 
for  six  brief  months.  There  is  much  to  be  learned  there,  and 
some  the  ballet's  teachings  may  be  advantageously  applied 
to  the  art  of  acting.  Studied  forms  of  dancing  are  not,  per- 
haps, an  essential  part  of  a  player's  outfit,  but  they  have  a 
certain  related  value  not  to  be  lightly  esteemed." — Perriton 
Maxwell. 

e  Perriton  Maxwell.  Her  parts  in  Mr.  Sothern's  company 
were:  Louisa  in  The  Highest  Bidder,  and  Jessie  Deane  in 
Lord  Chumley. 


MAUDE  ADAMS  331 

The  engagement  with  Sothern  was  brief, 
however,  like  all  that  had  gone  before.  Not 
until  she  was  given  the  part  of  Dot  Bradbury 
in  Hoyt's  farce  A  Midnight  Bell  (in  March 
1889)  did  circumstances  combine  to  give  her  a 
good  part,  a  long  engagement,  and  some  public 
notice.  Until  now  she  was  quite  unknown  to 
the  public  at  large.  But  she  played  this  part 
through  the  spring  and  aril  during  the  following 
season.  Discerning  playgoers,  and  a  critic 
here  and  there,  began  to  speak  of  her  as  one  of 
the  promising  youngsters  of  the  stage,  and 
what  was  more  important,  she  attracted  the  at- 
tention of  Charles  Frohman,  who  in  the  fall  of 
1890  was  organizing  a  stock  company  for  the 
Twenty-third  Street  Theatre.  Mr.  Frohman 
gave  Miss  Adams  a  place  in  this  company,  and 
from  that  day  until  his  death — twenty-four 
years — she  remained  under  his  management. 

Her  first  part  with  Mr.  Frohman  was  a  small 
one — Evangeline  Bender  in  All  the  Comforts 
of  Home.  She  gave  it  some  distinction,  how- 
ever, and  in  her  next  part,  in  Men  and 
Women,  she  was  watched  with  interest.  That 
Mr.  Frohman 's  choice  of  this  new  actress  was 
unfortunate,  was  the  opinion  of  many.  She 
was  small,  thin,  pale — quite  the  opposite  of  the 
accepted  type  of  stage  beauty;  but  she  acted 
well  enough,  apparently,  for  soon  she  was  play- 
ing Nell,  the  crippled  girl  in  The  Lost  Para- 
dise. The  part  called  for  one  passage  of 
heightened  emotion, — "a  fierce  little  bit  of 
melodrama"  that  served  to  attract  new  notice 


332      HEROINES  OP  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

to  Miss  Adams.  "In  an  audience  of  seasoned 
first-nighters  and  blase  fashionables  there  were 
moist  eyes  and  a  surreptitious  blowing  of 
noses  when  Maude  Adams  gave  rein  to  that 
tender  pathos  which  is  all  her  own/'  says  one 
witness.  "This  wan,  hopeless  figure  peering 
wistfully  from  its  shabby  raincoat  out  upon 
a  life  she  could  neither  know  nor  under- 
stand was  a  triumph  of  natural  emotion  simu- 
lated with  superb  restraint."  Mr.  Frohman 
showed  his  new  company  not  only  to  New  York, 
but  sent  it  on  long  tours  throughout  the  country. 
So  well  did  Miss  Adams  acquit  herself  in 
these  first  two  years  with  Mr.  Frohman  that  in 
1892,  when  John  Drew  left  the  company  of 
Augustin  Daly  after  eighteen  years'  service, 
and  became  a  "star,"  he  insisted  on  having  her 
as  his  leading  woman.  Mr.  Frohman,  his  new 
manager,  had  had  in  mind  someone  of  more 
established  reputation,  of  more  thoroughly 
tried  gifts.  But  Mr.  Drew  had  his  way,  and 
Miss  Adams  her  first  real  opportunity.  She 
was  surprisingly  successful.  The  play  was 
The  Masked  Ball7  Her  part  was  a  brilliant, 
high-comedy  role,  demanding  at  once  spirit  and 
subtlety.  It  was  admitted  that  she  did  not  look 
the  part,  that  there  was  something  awkward 
and  boyish  about  her  Suzanne  Blondet.  Yet 
her  intelligence,  her  fine  voice,  her  charm,  and 
her  sincerity  in  emotional  passages  won  her 
much  warm  praise.  It  was  her  difficult  task  in 

7  Produced  at  Palmer's  Theatre,  New  York,  October  3,  1892. 
It  was  a  French  play,  adapted  by  Clyde  Fitch. 


MAUDE  ADAMS  333 

one  passage  of  this  play  to  act  a  woman  who  is 
feigning  intoxication.  To  make  this  tipsy  scene 
anything  but  disagreeable  was  a  severe  test  for 
a  comparatively  unknown  woman,  who  at  best 
had  much  to  do  to  win  her  audience.  Win  it 
she  did,  however,  for  she  was  called  a  dozen 
times  before  the  curtain.  The  Masked  Ball  had 
a  successful  career  of  a  year  and  a  half,  and 
Maude  Adams,  at  its  close,  had  pretty  well  es- 
tablished herself.  At  less  than  twenty  she  was 
a  "leading  woman, "  the  youngest  of  the  day. 

Miss  Adams  remained  as  John  Drew's  prin- 
cipal supporting  actress  for  five  seasons — from 
the  fall  of  1892  to  the  spring  of  1897.8 

The  success  of  The  Masked  Ball  was  not  re- 
peated at  once,  not  until  four  years  later,  in- 
deed, when  Rosemary  gave  both  Mr.  Drew  and 
Miss  Adams  excellent  opportunities.  In  the 
meantime  she  had  had  occasional  small  tri- 
umphs, and  only  one  approach  to  downright 
failure — in  The  Squire  of  Dames.  In  this 
play  she  had  the  part  of  a  flippant,  heartless 
young  society  woman,  and,  truth  to  tell,  she 
didn't  do  much  with  it.  In  the  Bauble  Shop, 
however,  she  had  had  an  opportunity  for  her 
simplicity  and  pathos,  while  in  That  Imprudent 
Young  Couple  she  rose  superior  to  the  play, 

s  Her  parts  were:  Suzanne  in  The  Masked  Ball,  1892; 
Miriam  in  The  Butterflies,  1894;  Jessie  Keber  in  The  Bauble 
Shop,  1894;  Marion  in  That  Imprudent  Young  Couple,  1895; 
Dora  in  Christopher,  Jr.,  1895;  Adeline  Dennant  in  The 
Squire  of  Dames,  1896;  Dorothy  Cruikshank  in  Rosemary, 
August,  189G.  On  December  9,  1896,  she  played  Mary  Verner 
in  Too  Happy  by  Half. 


334      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

and  prompted  this  criticism:  "That  Miss 
Adams  was  able  to  interest  her  audience  at  all 
last  night  was  due  entirely  to  the  charm  of  her 
own  personality.  Her  work  is  still  exceptional 
in  its  daintiness  and  its  simplicity.  .  .  .  She  has 
found  the  short  cut  from  laughter  into  tears. 
It  is  good  to  see  that  the  remarkable  success 
that  has  come  to  this  young  actress  has  not 
turned  her  head.'' 

As  for  Rosemary,  the  last  play  of  the  John 
Drew-Maude  Adams  period,  it  is  to  be  said  that 
it  is  one  of  the  most  charming  of  the  many  plays 
of  its  gifted  and  long-laboring  author,  Louis 
N.  Parker.  It  is  a  pleasantly  old-fashioned, 
idyllic  comedy  of  the  England  of  Victoria's  ac- 
cession, and  seems  to  have  disclosed  equally 
Miss  Adams's  gifts  of  comedy  and  of  pathos ; — 
a  play  well  suited  to  her  middle  period. 

At  this  time  James  M.  Barrie  was  in  America. 
He  was  planning  the  dramatization  of  his  novel 
The  Little  Minister.  He  saw  Miss  Adams  as 
Dorothy  and  marked  her  at  once  as  the  woman 
to  play  his  Lady  Babbie.  Mr.  Frohman  already 
had  half -formed  plans  for  promoting  her,  and 
the  opportunity  to  play  The  Little  Minister  came 
just  at  the  right  moment.  Mr.  Drew  was  de- 
prived of  his  popular  leading  woman,  and  on 
September  13,  1897,  at  the  Lafayette  Square 
Opera  House  in  Washington  (and  two  weeks 
later  at  the  Empire  in  New  York)  Maude 
Adams  was  launched  upon  her  career  as  a 
"star."  The  success  of  play  and  player  was 
immediate  and  great,  for  on  this  occasion  began 


MAUDE  ADAMS  335 

that  combination  of  dramatist  and  actress — 
Barrie  and  Maude  Adams — that  has  proved  so 
singularly  appealing, — not  only  in  this  play, 
but  in  Quality  Street,  in  Peter  Pan,  What  Every 
Woman  Knows,  and  in  The  Legend  of  Leonora? 
For  three  whole  seasons  Maude  Adams 
played  Lady  Babbie,  the  first  season  in  New 
York  and  then,  until  the  spring  of  1900,  up  and 
down  the  whole  country.  It  earned  for  her  sev- 
eral fortunes.  The  play  is,  as  Mr.  Winter  10  has 
said,  a  "neat  but  inadequate  paraphrase"  of  the 
novel,  and  the  character  of  Babbie  has  not  the 
substance  and  power  of  the  Babbie  of  the  book. 
Believed  of  the  necessity  for  an  emotional  power 
that  is  probably  beyond  her,  Miss  Adams  was 
left  free  to  delight  her  audience  with  the  way- 
wardness and  sweetness  of  the  new  Babbie  of 
the  play.  Miss  Adams  gave  the  character  a 
peculiar  other-worldly  charm  that  seemed  then 
to  have  made  its  way  to  the  stage  for  the  first 
time,  and  that  lingers  in  the  minds  of  many 

»  The  plays  and  parts  of  Maude  Adams'  "stardom"  are  as 
follows:  Lady  Babbie  in  The  Little  Minister,  1897;  Mrs. 
Hilary  in  Mrs.  Hilary  Regrets  (special  performance,  with  John 
Drew),  1897;  Juliet  in  Romeo  and  Juliet  (supplementary 
spring  season),  1899;  Duke  of  Reichstadt  in  L'Aiglon,  1900; 
Phoebe  Throssell  in  Quality  Street,  1901 ;  Pepita  in  The  Pretty 
Sister  of  Jos<5,  1903;  Amanda  Affleck  in  'Op  0'  Me  Thumb  (in 
one  act),  1905;  Peter  Pan,  1905;  Viola  in  Twelfth  Night  (at 
Harvard),  1908;  Chicot  in  The  Jesters,  1908*;  Maggie  Wylie  in 
What  Every  Woman  Knows,  1908;  Joan  of  Arc  in  The  Maid  of 
Orleans  (at  Harvard),  1909;  Rosalind  in  As  You  Like  it 
(University  of  California),  1910;  Chanticler,  1911;  Leonora  in 
The  Legend  of  Leonora,  1913.  This  list  does  not  include  re- 
vivals. 

10  The  Wallet  of  Time,  vol.  II. 


336      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

playgoers  as  the  best  remembered  achievement 
of  her  career.  It  is  probably  true  that  she  had 
even  before  had  parts  calling  for  more  varied 
and  difficult  work,  but  the  popular  success  of 
The  Little  Minister  was  one  of  the  extraordi- 
nary incidents  in  American  theatrical  annals.11 
To  vary  the  task  of  repeating  the  same  role 
months  on  end,  and  (perhaps  chiefly)  to  satisfy 
her  ambitions,  Miss  Adams  essayed,  in  the 
Spring  of  1899,  her  first  Shakespearean  part, 
Juliet  in  Romeo  and  Juliet.  The  result  was 
anything  but  a  complete  success,  though  her 
thick-and-thin  admirers  professed  themselves 
pleased.  William  Faversham  was  Borneo,  and 
James  K.  Hackett,  Mercutio.  Miss  Adams  as 
Juliet  left  much  to  be  desired.  She  has  a  gra- 
cious, elfish,  quite  individual  charm;  she  has 
winning  humor  and  a  quiet,  directly  appealing 
power  of  pathos ;  she  is  the  interpreter  par  ex- 
cellence of  the  delicate,  touching  whimsies  of 
Barrie ;  but  she  has  not,  or  had  not  then,  tragic 
power.  Juliet,  it  need  not  be  said,  demands  a 
large  share  of  such  power.  Young  as  Shakes- 
peare represents  her  to  be,  she  is  a  creature 
of  glamorous  beauty  and  consuming  passion. 
Such  Miss  Adams  could  not  make  her.  She 
could  and  did  make  Juliet  pleasantly  and  touch- 
ingly  girlish,  a  graceful,  fragile,  pathetic  figure. 
But  Romeo  and  Juliet  was  not  an  artistic  suc- 

11  Children,  corsets  and  cigars  were  named  after  her; — as  a 
matter  of  fact  I  know  one  ten-year-old  child  who  has  thirteen 
dolls,  and  every  one  of  them  bears  the  same  identical  name, 
Maude  Adams." — Acton  Davies. 


MAUDE  ADAMS  337 

cess  (though  it  was  a  financial  one)  and  Miss 
Adams  speedily  dropped  the  part.  "I  have  not 
done  what  I  intended  to  do,"  she  honestly  ac- 
knowledged. 

But  her  next  part  was  not,  as  one  might  have 
expected,  a  return  to  the  medium  of  her  ac- 
cepted successes.  It  was  even  a  step  further 
away.  Bernhardt,  in  the  spring  of  1900,  had 
acted  the  Duke  of  Eeichstadt  in  Bostand's  play 
L'Aiglon.  Eeichstadt  was  the  son  of  Napoleon 
the  Great  and  Marie  Louise  of  Austria.  The 
play  tells  the  story  of  his  abortive  attempt  to 
regain  his  father 's  throne.  Miss  Adams,  a  few 
months  after  Bernhardt 's  production  in  Paris, 
essayed  the  part  in  New  York,  of  course  in  an 
English  version.12  Like  one  part  she  had 
played  before,  Juliet,  and  another  she  was  to 
play  later,  Chanticler,  Eeichstadt  was  too  large 
and  exacting  a  part  for  her.  Yet  by  reason  of 
her  own  physical  characteristics  she  suggested 
the  weakness  and  effeminacy  of  the  young 
Duke,  and  in  the  lighter  scenes  she  was  pleasing 
and  satisfying.  In  the  more  serious  scenes — 
and  there  are  two  that  require  great  acting  in 
the  tempestuous  strain:  the  Mirror  Scene,  in 
which  Eeichstadt  is  shown  by  Metternich  the 
hopeless  weakness  of  his  character  and  the  des- 
peration of  his  cause ;  and  the  scene  on  the  bat- 
tlefield of  Wagram,  where  "the  eaglet "  is 
crushed  by  visions  of  his  father's  ruthless  ca- 
reer,— in  these  scenes  Miss  Adams  was  interest- 
ing and  pathetic,  but  she  hardly  exhausted  the 

12  Prepared  by  Louis  N.  Parker  and  Edward  Rose. 


338       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

possibilities.13  The  production  of  L'Aiglon 
could  not,  however,  fail  to  add  to  her  artistic 
reputation  and  to  her  immense  popularity,  if 
that  were  possible. 

With  Quality  Street,  a  delightful,  simple,  sun- 
shiny play  by  Barrie  in  which  she  was  the  lov- 
able and  thoroughly  feminine  Phoebe  Throssell, 
and  in  the  far  less  attractive  play  The  Pretty 
Sister  of  Jose,  in  which  she  was  a  Spanish  girl, 
"of  delicate,  winning  sensibility, " 14  Miss 
Adams  returned  to  the  sort  of  acting  which  in 
The  Little  Minister  had  made  her  name  univer- 
sally known. 

Never,  however,  before  or  since,  has  Miss 
Adams'  popularity  risen  to  such  a  pitch  as  it 
did  upon  the  production  of  Peter  Pan.  First 
produced  in  1905,  it  ran  for  three  seasons,  and 
when  Miss  Adams  revived  it  recently  and  took 
it  far  and  wide  about  the  country  it  proved  as 
popular  as  ever.  It  may  be,  as  Mr.  Winter 

is  She  was  at  her  best  in  the  scene  of  supplication  and  child- 
like blandishment  with  the  old  Austrian  Emperor.  The  vein 
of  Miss  Adams  is  domestic  and  romantic — not  tragic.  She  car- 
ried the  second  act  of  the  play  with  sustained  vivacity  and 
gratifying  skill.  Possessed  of  a  gentle  personality  and  capable 
of  a  piquant  behavior,  Miss  Adams  was  a  sprightly  and  bonnie 
lass  in  The  Little  Minister,  and  that  performance  furnished  the 
measure  of  her  ability.  As  Reichstadt  she  gave  an  intelligent 
performance,  on  a  commonplace  level." — William  Winter,  The 
Wallet  of  Time. 

i*  William  Winter.  His  appreciation  of  some  qualities  of  the 
impersonation  did  not  prevent  his  saying:  "Pepita,  as  imper- 
sonated by  Miss  Adams,  was  a  tenuous  damsel,  of  peevish 
aspect,  who  closed  her  teeth  and  spoke  through  them,  pro- 
ducing, at  times,  a  strange,  nasal  sound,  as  of  a  sheep  bleat- 
ing." 


MAUDE  ADAMS  339 

says,  "  immeasurably  inferior,  in  fancy  and  sat- 
ire, to  Alice  in  Wonderland."  But  then,  Mr. 
Winter  found  it  at  times  puerile  and  tedious, 
and  could  discern  nothing  in  it  but  a  diversion 
for  children.  That  it  certainly  was,  but  the 
children's  ages  ran  from  four  to  fourscore.  It 
was  a  matter  of  common  observation,  even  in 
that  supposed  center  of  case-hardened  world- 
liness,  New  York,  that  the  audiences  were 
largely  of  grown-ups,  and  that  stock-brokers, 
" tired  business  men,"  and  others  who  would 
flee  miles  from  the  ordinary  " children's  play," 
came  not  once,  but  thrice,  a  dozen  times,  in  some 
cases,  to  see  the  triumph  of  Peter  over  Captain 
Hook.  The  elfin  quality,  the  gracious  charm 
and  warm-hearted  humor  of  Miss  Adams'  Peter 
Pan  may  not  have  been  sufficient  to  make  it, 
as  a  feat  of  acting,  her  most  memorable 
achievement;  but  play  and  player  have  won 
their  way  into  the  public's  affections  more 
thoroughly  than  anything  else  she  has  done — 
more  even  than  The  Little  Minister. 

In  another  Barrie  play,  What  Every  Woman 
Knows — produced  after  the  comparatively 
short  life  of  The  Jesters,  a  romantic  mediaeval 
play  in  which  she  displayed  her  familiar  ability 
without  working  any  great  advance  or  change — 
Miss  Adams  accomplished  what  remains  as 
probably  the  most  noteworthy  acting,  as  acting, 
of  her  career.  She  entered  thoroughly  into  the 
part  of  Maggie  Wylie — the  Scotch  woman  who, 
while  regaining,  in  a  novel  way,  her  errant  hus- 
band, demonstrates  again  "what  every  woman 


340      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

knows," — the  dependence  of  mere  man  upon 
woman.  The  play  was  a  delightful  instance  of 
Barriers  gift  for  dressing  human  truths  in 
whimsical  fancy;  Miss  Adams,  in  the  well 
chosen  words  of  Mr.  Winter,  combined  "good- 
ness, tenderness,  magnanimity,  pride,  mother- 
hood, and  pity  with  some  little  dash  of  tart- 
ness,— and  gave  a  performance  which  needed 
only  flexibility  and  more  essential  Scotch  char- 
acter to  make  it  as  entirely  enjoyable  as  it  was 
artistically  consistent."15 

When  Maude  Adams  was  announced  as  Mr. 
Frohman's  choice  for  Chanticler  in  Bostand's 
barnyard  drama  of  that  name,  there  was  much 
plain-spoken  wonder.  It  was  felt  by  even  her 
most  cordial  well-wishers  that  her  ambitions 
and  Mr.  Frohman's  indulgence  of  them  could 
not  well  go  further.  Facetiously  expressing 
this  feeling,  Life  announced  that  Mr.  Frohman's 
next  production  would  be  Shakespeare 's  trag- 
edy of  King  Lear,  with  Maude  Adams  in  the 
title  part.  Chanticler  demands  an  actor  of  the 
somewhat  florid  style,  at  least  an  actor  skilled 
in  poetic  speech.  The  "make-up"  is  as  nearly 
as  possible  the  fac-simile  of  our  old  friend  the 
barn-yard  rooster,  comb,  tail  feathers,  spurs 
and  all.  It  can  easily  be  seen  that  an  elocution- 
ist, in  such  a  part,  is  a  necessity.  It  was  gener- 
ally said  that  the  single  and  obvious  choice  for 

is  "At  the  moment  when  Maggie  destroys  Shand's  written 
promise  of  marriage  and  again  at  the  moment  when  she  gazes 
on  the  beauty  who  has  bewitched  her  husband,  Miss  Adams 
attained  to  the  loftiest  height  she  has  reached,  in  the  expres- 
sion of  feeling." — The  Wallet  of  Time. 


MAUDE  ADAMS  341 

Clianticler  was  Otis  Skinner,  who  would  indeed 
have  been  ideal.  Still,  Miss  Adams,  somehow, 
certainly  escaped  failure.  She  is  fragile  and  a 
woman,  not  a  robust  man;  but  her  Chanticler 
took  on,  through  her  intelligence  and  sincerity, 
a  share  of  the  impressiveness  that  the  part 
needed,  though  one  felt  that  Miss  Adams  could 
have  been  spending  her  ability  to  better  advan- 
tage. The  apparent  perversity  that  has  taken 
a  sweetly  feminine,  very  American  woman,  of 
limited  powers  but  sure  ability  to  delight  within 
her  proper,  modern  field,  and  made  her  first  a 
heroine  of  Shakespearean  tragedy,  then  a  de- 
cadent, disease-stricken  youth,  then  a  young 
mediaeval  nobleman  in  masquerade,  and  later 
the  embodiment,  several  times  life  size,  of  a 
rooster,  has  been  one  of  the  strange  phenomena 
of  the  recent  American  stage.  The  extenuating 
circumstances  are  first  that  managers  are  al- 
ways more  or  less  at  a  loss  for  good  plays,  par- 
ticularly for  a  strongly  individualized  actress; 
and  further  that  Miss  Adams,  greatly  to  her 
credit,  did  nothing  without  casting  over  it  at 
least  the  glamour  of  a  fine  intelligence  and  an 
admirable  ambition. 

A  marvelous  exhibition  of  what  Miss  Adams 
and  Mr.  Frohman,  when  they  put  their  heads 
together,  could  do  in  the  way  of  contrast  to 
Phoebe  Throssell  and  Maggie  Wylie,  was  the 
production  for  a  single  performance  in  the 
great  Stadium  at  Harvard,  one  night  in  June, 
1909,  of  Schiller's  Maid  of  Orleans.  Miss 
Adams  had  played  Twelfth  Night  in  Sanders 


342      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Theatre  one  evening  a  year  before.  The  Maid 
of  Orleans  was  an  outgrowth  of  the  earlier  per- 
formance and  was  undertaken  at  the  suggestion 
of  the  German  department  of  Harvard.  That 
there  were  one  hundred  and  fifty  mounted 
knights  in  full  armor,  one  thousand  men-at- 
arms,  two  hundred  citizens,  one  hundred  and 
fifty  women  and  children,  one  hundred  and 
twenty  musicians,  and  ninety  singers,  besides 
sixty  speaking  parts,  gives  some  idea  of  the 
magnitude  of  this  unique  presentation.  In  the 
coronation  scene  more  than  fifteen  hundred  per- 
sons were  on  the  improvised  Stadium  stage. 
The  cost  of  this  single  evening's  performance, 
with  its  specially  constructed  scenery  and  long 
preparation,  was  tremendous.  And  Maude 
Adams  planned  and  carried  through  the  entire 
proceeding.  "This,"  said  one  perhaps  over- 
enthusiastic  spectator,  "is  the  biggest  thing 
ever  undertaken  by  any  woman,  except  the  one 
she  is  representing."  And  through  it  all  Miss 
Adams  was  playing  the  Maid,  even  to  leading, 
on  a  great  white  charger,  the  troops  of  France 
in  the  battle  charge.  The  spectacular  effects — 
the  storm  scene,  the  battle  scene,  the  scene  of 
the  coronation — were  vastly  impressive,  though 
the  petite  figure  and  delicate  art  of  the  principal 
actress  were  often  lost  in  the  largeness  of  her 
surroundings. 

Maude  Adams  and  James  M.  Barrie  seem  to 
have  been,  artistically,  born  for  each  other.  At 
any  rate,  it  is  in  his  plays — The  Little  Minister, 
Quality  Street,  Peter  Pan,  What  Every  Woman 


MAUDE  ADAMS  343 

Knows, — that  she  has  deservedly  won  her  fame. 
The  latest  in  the  list  is  The  Legend  of  Leonora, 
in  which  she  has  forsaken  Chanticler's  feathers 
and  Peter  Pan's  breeches  once  more  to  don  pet- 
ticoats. It  brings  Miss  Adams  back  to  a  doting 
public  in  a  part  that  gives  rein  to  her  old  time 
ability  as  a  light  comedienne.  That  a  portion 
of  this  public  is  more  or  less  shocked  to  see  its 
beloved  Maude  Adams  playing  the  part  of  a 
murderess — even  though  Leonora  and  her  crime 
are  amiable  unrealities — indicates  the  strongly 
personal  element  in  the  popularity  of  the  ac- 
tress.16 

This  personal  element  has  been  introduced 
into  the  Maude  Adams  worship  solely  across  the 
footlights.  That  is  to  say,  the  public  knows 
next  to  nothing  of  her  as  a  human  being  except 
as  her  personality  is  poured  into  and  out  of  her 
work.  Out  of  a  native  shyness  as  well  as  out 
of  a  desire  to  avoid  publicity  except  as  an  act- 
ress, she  carries  her  self-effacement  off  the 
stage  to  the  last  degree.  She  is  never  met  at 
social  gatherings,  she  has  never  addressed 
meetings  or  written  magazine  articles;  she  is 
seldom  seen  on  the  streets  or  driving  in  the 
park,  and  the  occasions  on  which  she  has,  in 
many  years,  gone  to  any  theatre  as  one  of  the 
audience  could  be  numbered  on  one's  fingers. 
She  dresses  with  the  utmost  quietness  and  with 
small  regard  to  current  styles. 

is  And  indicates  also,  in  the  same  people,  a  lamentably  re- 
stricted judgment  of  the  artistic  side  of  what  they  see  on  the 
stage. 


344      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

But  her  shrinking  from  "the  general"  is,  one 
need  hardly  say,  without  trace  of  a  sour  atti- 
tude toward  the  world.  She  is  said  to  be  chary 
of  personal  friendships,  but  those  who  know  her 
best  speak  glowingly  of  her  bountiful  kindness. 
She  has,  of  course,  made  a  great  deal  of  money. 
A  considerable  share  of  it  has  gone,  unostenta- 
tiously, to  the  relief  of  the  needy.  She  is  said 
to  have  a  list  of  pensioners: — old,  destitute 
players,  or  acquaintances  of  her  early  life.17 

Miss  Adams  has  always  taken  a  keen  interest 
in  the  mechanical  side  of  the  theatre.  More 
than  most  actresses  she  knows  the  intricacies 
and  the  artistry  of  scenery  and  lighting,  and  has 
much  to  say  of  them  when  she  is  to  appear  in  a 
new  part.  She  has,  indeed,  her  own  office  in 
the  Empire  Theatre  building  and  there  conducts 

17  Frederic  Dean  has  given  one  or  two  cases  of  her  bounty: 
"There  used  to  be  an  old  doorkeeper  at  the  stage  entrance  of  the 
Empire  Theatre.  One  day  he  was  taken  sick  and  his  place  was 
filled  by  another.  Miss  Adams  learned  that  the  old  chap  had 
lost  his  position  and  made  a  hurried  search  for  him,  tracing 
him,  at  last,  to  an  East  Side  tenement.  It  was  long  after  mid- 
night when  she  found  him.  He  was  very  ill  and  was  being 
taken  care  of  by  his  faithful  wife  as  best  she  could.  Doctors 
and  nurses  were  immediately  summoned  and  every  possible 
comfort  provided ;  and  the  next  morning,  and  the  next,  and  the 
next  came  Lady  Bountiful — and  every  day,  until  the  sufferer 
died  a  month  later. 

"For  sixteen  years  Robert  Eberle  was  in  Charles  Frohman's 
employ  as  business  manager.  One  year,  late  in  the  season,  he 
was  taken  ill  and  left  in  a  hospital  in  South  Bend,  Indiana. 
Miss  Adams  was  playing  in  the  West  at  the  time,  and  hearing 
of  Mr.  Eberle's  illness — though  several  hundred  miles  from  the 
hospital— left  her  company  on  Saturday  night,  went  to  South 
Bend,  spent  Sunday  at  the  sick  man's  bedside,  and,  leaving 
orders  for  the  best  of  medical  treatment,  returned  to  her  work 
just  in  time  to  dress  for  her  part  on  Monday  night." 


MAUDE  ADAMS  345 

the  many  details  of  organizing  a  production. 
In  adoring  a  sweet  and  fragile  woman  her  ad- 
mirers are  likely  to  forget  that  Maude  Adams  is 
a  thoroughly  trained  woman  of  the  theatre,  of 
tried  executive  ability. 

The  sweetness  and  simplicity  of  Maude 
Adams  herself  and  of  her  acting  comes  in  part, 
one  is  tempted  to  think,  from  her  very  real  love 
of  nature.  She  has  a  New  York  home — and  a 
quiet  retreat  it  is — but  her  real  abiding  place, 
when  her  work  permits,  is  at  Sandy  garth  Farm 
on  Long  Island,  where  she  owns  what  may  fairly 
be  called  an  estate.  She  has  there  her  stables, 
her  kennels,  her  fields  under  cultivation,  her 
woods;  and  she  knows  the  details  of  farming 
only  less  well  than  the  secrets  of  stagecraft. 
She  has,  too,  a  bungalow  in  the  Catskills.  She 
is  fond  of  riding  and  of  long  walks  in  the  coun- 
try. Books  form  an  inevitable  furnishing  in 
all  three  houses.  She  has  given  herself  a  good 
schooling  in  French,  and  she  is  on  more  than 
speaking  terms  with  the  philosophers  and  poets. 
She  likes  foreign  travel,  and  has  made  several 
trips  to  Europe  and  the  near  East.  She  plays 
well  the  piano  and  the  harp  and  when  oppor- 
tunity offers  she  goes  to  symphony  concerts. 
Altogether  she  is  a  serious-minded  devotee  of 
the  essential,  the  beautiful  and  the  simple.  She 
is  of  course  aware  of  her  own  great  popularity. 
But  the  feeling  it  inspires  in  her  is  said  by  her 
friends  to  be  one  of  humility  and  wonder.  And 
whatever  her  rank  as  an  artist,  she  has  sent 
across  the  footlights  her  simplicity,  her  sense 


346      HEROINES  OP  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

of  sweetness  and  light,  to  be  a  beneficent  in- 
fluence. Her  picture,  cut  from  a  magazine  and 
pinned  to  the  wall  of  a  ranch  house  in  the  far 
West,  or  of  a  tenement  in  the  slums  of  an  East- 
ern city,  is  a  symbol  of  something  good  added 
to  American  life. 


SOME  AMERICAN  ACTRESSES 
OF  TODAY 

"FTHHERE  is  no  great  acting  now,"  the  vet- 
A  eran  theatregoer  will  tell  you.  "The 
day  of  the  stars  has  passed. ' '  He  who  remem- 
bers vividly  Charlotte  Cnshman,  Edwin  Booth 
and  Madame  Janauschek  feels  that  times  have 
changed  indeed.  And  he  is  quite  right.  But 
sometimes  he  is  sure,  with  Mr.  Winter,  that  they 
have  changed  altogether  for  the  worse.  And 
there  he  is  wrong.  If  it  seems  true  that  with 
the  passing  from  our  stage  of  Madame  Mod- 
jeska,  Miss  Rehan  and  Miss  Marlowe  the  robes 
of  high  priestess  of  our  stage,  to  whom  all  the 
people  delight  to  burn  incense,  grace  alone  the 
slender  form  of  Miss  Maude  Adams,  that  fact 
does  not  necessarily  argue  a  lack  of  genius  in 
the  artists  that  remain.  We  are,  on  the  whole 
fortunately,  abolishing  the  rank  of  high  priest- 
ess. 

All  the  women,  with  one  or  two  exceptions, 
who  are  the  subjects  of  the  preceding  chapters 
have  been  out-and-out  exponents  of  the  star  sys- 
tem. It  is  an  undesirable  system,  which  is  not 
essential  to  the  theatre  and  which  is  only  a  pass- 
ing phase,  though  it  has  lasted  a  matter  of  cen- 
turies, and  though  we  owe  to  it  many  names  that 
make  illustrious  the  annals  of  the  drama.  It  is 

347 


348      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

undesirable  because  it  subordinates  the  play, 
which  first  and  last  should  be  "the  thing,"  to 
the  interpreter  of  the  play,  because  it  exercises 
a  vicious  influence  on  playwrights  who  write  to 
clothe  personalities  rather  than  their  own  ideas, 
and  an  equally  vicious  influence  on  actors  who 
think  of  plays  primarily  as  opportunities  for 
histrionic  exploits.  "But,"  some  one  says, 
"did  not  Shakespeare  himself  write  plays  that 
are  obviously  for  stars?"  Well,  he  certainly 
wrote  plays  upon  which  starship  has  battened. 
Like  any  other  good  plays,  however,  Shake- 
speare 's  plays  are  even  better  when  the  starship, 
as  such,  is  left  out,  as  any  one  will  testify  who 
has  seen  them  acted  without  the  extraneous  ele- 
ment that  is  symbolized  by  enormous  type  on 
the  play-bill. 

To  think  of  the  theatre  first  of  all  in  terms  of 
actors  and  actresses  is,  however,  natural  enough. 
It  is  a  popular  way  of  looking  at  the  theatre, 
and  it  would  be  idle  to  expect  its  total  disappear- 
ance. And  it  would  be  ungrateful.  Actors  and 
actresses  are  public  servants  and  benefactors, 
to  whom  recognition  and  praise  are  due.  But 
recognition  is  one  thing;  starship,  with  all  its 
adulations, — Bernhardtism, — is  another.  And 
there  are  good  reasons  for  thinking  that  other 
aspects  of  the  theatre  are  also  becoming  popu- 
ular. 

The  early  years  of  the  twentieth  century 
have  been  a  period  of  rapid  development  in  the 
theatre,  a  development  marked  by  at  least  two 
broad  phenomena:  first,  the  growing  public 


AMERICAN  ACTRESSES  OF  TODAY      349 

sense  of  the  drama  as  an  art,  of  which  acting 
is  a  component  part,  not  the  chief  end;  and, 
secondly,  the  revolution  in  the  technique  of 
stage-craft.  To  sum  up  the  matter  in  a  word, 
the  stage  is  struggling,  rather  blindly,  to  liber- 
ate itself  from  the  conventions  that  intervene 
between  audience  and  play.  As  an  incident  in 
that  liberation,  the  star  system  is  on  its  way, 
not  to  destruction,  for  the  actor  of  genius  will 
always  remain  a  compelling  figure,  but  at  least 
to  broad  modification.  Starless  casts  and  rep- 
ertory companies  have  been  plentiful  enough 
to  indicate  the  beginnings  of  a  strong,  new 
current. 

Again,  playwriting  and  acting,  hand  in  hand, 
have  become  more  realistic,  more  subtle,  more 
psychological;  there  are  far  fewer  opportuni- 
ties for  broad  effects  than  in  the  old  days,  there 
is  far  less  of  the  intense  concentration  of  play- 
wright and  audience  on  a  single  character  and 
a  single  actor  or  actress.  It  is  probable  that 
even  if  a  Bernhardt  or  a  Duse  or  a  Cushman 
should  spring  up  in  our  midst  she  would  find 
effective  physical  and  psychological  barriers  to 
an  ascension  to  starship  as  those  illustrious 
women  have  known  it. 

Very  briefly  indicated,  these  are  some  of  the 
phases  of  the  phenomenon  that  may  easily  be 
mistaken  by  the  cherisher  of  traditions  as  the 
passing  of  first-rate  acting.  Though  it  is  dif- 
ferent in  tone  and  method,  and  leads  less  often 
to  extreme  heights  of  public  notice,  acting  to- 
day succeeds  as  well  in  its  adaptation  to  the 


350      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

newer  ideal  of  the  primacy  of  the  play  as  did  the 
older  school  in  the  exaltation  of  the  actor. 

It  is  a  rather  odd  circumstance  that  while 
the  English  stage  is  rich  in  its  actors  and  com- 
paratively scantily  supplied  with  excellent  ac- 
tresses, the  reverse  is  true  in  America,  so  far 
as  concerns  the  younger  generation.  Our  civ- 
ilization seems  to  breed  actresses  thickly  at 
home,  and  to  entice  them  from  abroad.  When 
Edward  Sothern,  Otis  Skinner,  David  Warfield, 
Henry  Miller,  Eobert  Mantell,  John  Drew,  Will- 
iam Gillette  and  even  Mr.  Hackett,  Mr.  Faver- 
sham  and  Mr.  Daly  shall  have  retired  from  the 
stage,  who  is  to  help  Ernest  Glendinning  and 
the  imported  Mr.  Lou-Tellegen  maintain  the 
honors  of  their  sex!  But  when  Mrs.  Fiske  and 
Maude  Adams  shall  have  followed  Julia  Mar- 
lowe into  retirement,  there  still  will  be,  even  if 
Ethel  Barrymore  and  Margaret  Anglin  should 
regrettably  have  left  the  stage,  a  considerable 
group  of  still  younger  actresses,  none  of  whom 
may  ever  achieve  stardom  as  it  was  once  prac- 
ticed, but  each  of  whom  fits  with  admirable 
ability  into  the  newer  order  of  things. 

Better  than  almost  any  one  else,  Miss  Barry- 
more  represents  the  dangers  of  the  star  system. 
The  daughter  of  one  of  America's  best  actors, 
Maurice  Barrymore,1  and  the  niece  of  another, 
John  Drew,  she  was  a  marked  victim  from  the 
beginning.  Charles  Frohman  made  her  a  star 
in  1900,  when  she  was  twenty-one.  She  had  had 

i  Ethel  Barrymore  was  born  at  Philadelphia,  August  15, 
1879.  Her  mother  was  the  actress,  Georgie  Drew-B anymore. 


AMERICAN  ACTRESSES  OF  TODAY      351 

a  scant  half  dozen  years  of  training  in  her 
uncle's  company  in  America  and  in  Henry  Irv- 
ing 's  company  in  England,  and  had  not  played 
more  than  a  dozen  parts  in  all.  She  was  made 
a  star  simply  on  the  strength  of  a  pleasing  per- 
sonality, intelligence,  a  pretty  face,  and  a  work- 
ing grasp  of  stage  behavior. 

During  the  next  decade,  playing  in  pieces  like 
Captain  Jinks  of  the  Horse  Marines,  Cousin 
Kate,  and  Sunday,  she  attracted  and  held  a  loyal 
public  that  liked  to  see  her  personality  exploited 
in  those  comparatively  insignificant  plays,  just 
as  adoring  theatregoers  throng  today  to  see 
Billie  Burke  and  Marie  Doro,  whatever  the 
slenderness  and  frothiness  of  the  play.  But 
let  Miss  Barrymore,  in  an  effort  to  be  a  real 
actress,  try  her  hand  at  submerging  herself  in 
an  un-Barrymorelike  character,  in  a  play  of  any 
serious  interest,  and  that  adoring  public  was  be- 
wildered and  disappointed  and  remained  away 
from  the  theatre.  Such  are  the  fruits  of  think- 
ing of  the  theatre  in  terms  of  the  actor. 

But  Miss  Barrymore  had  it  in  her  to  be  a 
real  actress.  Once  in  a  while,  prompted  by  her 
ambition,  she  would  do  something  that  her  fond 
followers  would  think  was  queer.  Thus,  dur- 
ing this  decade,  from  1900  to  1910,  in  the  midst 
of  her  prosperous  playing  of  popular  pieces,  she 
acted  at  one  time  or  another  Carrots,  a  one-act 
play  from  the  French  in  which  she  gave  a  pa- 
thetic picture  of  the  boy-hero ;  then,  at  a  single 
plunge,  Ibsen's  A  Doll's  House;  then  Alice-Sit- 
by-the-Fire,  a  play  that  Barrie  wrote  for  Ellen 


352      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Terry,  and  in  which  Miss  Barrymore,  to  the 
consternation  of  her  peculiar  public,  appeared 
as  a  gray-haired  matron;  and  finally  The  Silver 
Box,  an  unrelievedly  serious  and  honest  play  by 
Galsworthy,  in  which  she  descended  to  the 
depths  by  acting  an  ordinary  scrub-woman. 

Not  all  of  these  did  Miss  Barrymore  play 
signally  well;  her  starship,  limiting  her  to  a 
play  or  two  per  year,  had  simply  not  afforded 
her  the  training  to  become  the  actress  she  has 
since  shown  herself  to  be.  But  in  these  brief 
experiments  at  least  she  was  feeling  her  way 
out  of  the  entanglements  of  theatrical  pettiness. 

When  Miss  Barrymore,  in  January,  1910,  ap- 
peared in  Pinero's  Mid-Channel,  she  had  mar- 
ried and  become  a  mother.  Whether  the  ad- 
mirers of  her  former  girlish  charm  and  slender- 
ness  liked  it  or  not,  she  was  now  inevitably  a 
deeper-natured  and  more  mature  woman  and, 
consequently,  capable  of  deeper  and  better  act- 
ing. The  fact  was  speedily  proved  in  Mid- 
Channel.  The  play  is  a  grim  tragedy  of  Eng- 
lish middle-class  life,  in  which  a  fine-natured 
wife,  after  a  gradual  course  of  unhappy,  de- 
teriorating life  with  a  selfish  and  sensual  hus- 
band, ends  her  problems  with  suicide ; — surely 
not  one  of  the  pretty  Barrymore  parts.  ' '  There 
will  be  hosts  of  the  'Barrymore  public,'  no 
doubt,  who  will  feel  that  in  Mid-Channel  they 
cannot  laugh  with  her/'  wrote  Walter  Prichard 
Eaton.  1 1  But  to  some  more  thoughtful  men  and 
women  it  is  a  source  of  rare  satisfaction  that 
at  last  the  promise  of  that  lovely  voice  and  ex- 


AMERICAN  ACTRESSES  OF  TODAY      353 

pressive  face  lias  been  fulfilled,  and  you  can 
weep  with  her,  suffer  with  her,  understand 
through  the  spell  of  her  acting  a  little  better  the 
sorrows  and  perplexities  of  our  frail  humanity. 
In  short,  Miss  Barrymore  has  become  an  ac- 
tress. .  .  .  Her  many  admirers,  gathered  in 
force,  who  evidently  knew  more  about  her  than 
they  cared  about  Pinero,  were  disposed  to  laugh 
in  the  first  act  during  the  scenes  of  her  bicker- 
ings. But  never  after  that  did  she  allow  them 
to  suppose  for  an  instant  that  they  were  not 
watching  a  serious  and  passionate  study  of  a 
woman's  tragedy." 

After  Mid-Channel,  Miss  Barrymore  had  to  be 
considered  as  one  of  the  artists  of  our  stage,  if 
she  and  her  managers  could  only  agree  to  let  her 
remain  so.  She  revived  Alice-Sit-by-the-Fire, 
and  played  it  with  far  more  feeling  and  a  more 
convincing  sense  of  maternity  than  she  had 
shown  before ;  she  has  played  the  insurgent  wife 
in  Barriers  one-act  masterpiece,  The  Twelve- 
Pound-Look,  with  a  sure-handed  mastery  of  the 
ironic  and  subtle  that  belongs  only  to  a  finished 
actress;  she  has,  most  recently  of  all,  acted 
Madame  Okraska,  in  the  dramatization  of 
Tante,  with  a  keenness  of  insight  into  character 
and  a  finesse  that  showed  again  how  far  she  had 
traveled  since  the  days  of  Captain  Jinks.  Let 
us  hope  that  henceforth  Miss  Barrymore 's  un- 
questioned talent  will  not  be  allowed  to  expend 
itself  on  unworthy  material. 

Next  to  Mrs.  Fiske,  the  leading  actress  of  our 
contemporary  stage  is  undoubtedly  Margaret 


354       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Anglin,2  Her  training  has  had  a  wider  range, 
and  her  artistry  a  more  varied  accomplishment, 
than  those  of  any  other  actress  on  onr  stage. 
Born  in  Canada  of  a  non- theatrical  family,  she 
came  to  New  York  to  study.  She  is  one  of  our 
few  brilliant  actresses  who  have  come  to  the 
stage  by  way  of  the  dramatic  schools.  In  1894, 
when  she  was  eighteen,  she  was  Madeline  West 
in  Charles  Frohman's  production  of  Shenan- 
doah.  When  she  was  twenty  she  was  playing 
Ophelia  and  Virginia  in  James  O'Neill's  com- 
pany, and  from  that  day  to  this  she  has  been  one 
of  America's  dependable  and  versatile  stage  ar- 
tists. 

A  few  years  ago  we  thought  of  her  .as  a  power- 
ful emotional  actress  who  had  come  through  an 
apprenticeship  in  barnstorming,  and  an  early 
recognition  of  merit  as  Eoxane  to  Mansfield's 
Cyrano,  to  full  measured  achievement  in  Mrs. 
Dane's  Defence,  The  Great  Divide,  and  The 
Awakening  of  Helena  Ritchie, — with  a  large 
number  of  plays  and  parts  scattered  in  between. 
But  of  late  years  she  has  broadened  her  art 
and  made  secure  her  place  among  contemporary 
actresses  not  only  by  plunging  wholeheartedly 
into  a  campaign  in  Shakespeare,  but  by  ranging 
even  farther  and  acting  the  heroines  of  Greek 
tragedy.  Miss  Anglin  is  as  effective  in  comedy 
— witness  Green  Stockings  and  Lady  Winder- 
mere's  Fan  as  recent  instances,  and  her  Lady 

2  Margaret  Anglin  was  born  at  Ottawa,  April  2,  1876.  Her 
father  was  Speaker  of  the  Canadian  House  of  Commons,  and 
her  brother  was  Chief  Justice. 


AMERICAN  ACTRESSES  OF  TODAY      355 

Eastney  in  Mrs.  Dane's  Defence  for  an  earlier 
one — as  she  is  in  emotional  roles ;  she  has  acted 
in  Australia  as  well  as  in  America;  she  was  the 
first  artist  to  carry  about  the  country  a  reper- 
toire of  plays  set  in  accordance  with  the  ideals 
of  the  new  stagecraft;  and  as  Mr.  Eaton  has 
said,  "as  a  stage  manager  she  has  succeeded 
in  reviving  something  of  the  atmosphere  of  good 
breeding,  of  polite  comedy,  of  perfect  ensemble 
and  polish,  which  we  associate  with  the  memory 
of  Lester  Wallack."  It  is  an  ample,  dignified 
career,  now  happily  at  its  height,  of  hard  work- 
ing service  to  the  art  of  the  actress. 

When  in  1913  Miss  Anglin  made  herself  a 
Shakespearean  actress-manager,  the  size  of  her 
repertoire,  the  general  excellence  of  her  inter- 
pretations, and  the  revelation  of  the  beauties  of 
the  new  stage  art  that  signalized  her  perform- 
ances combined  to  give  American  theatregoers 
a  new  idea  of  her  ability  and  broadening  ambi- 
tion. The  plays  were  The  Taming  of  the 
Slirew,  Tivelfth  Night,  As  You  Like  It,  and  An- 
tony and  Cleopatra;  the  scenery  in  each  case 
was  a  beautiful  example — by  Livingston  Platt 
— of  the  imaginative  revolt  from  old  stage  con- 
ventions that  has  notably  marked  the  last 
decade;  and  Miss  Anglin *s  own  women  of 
Shakespeare, — though  her  Cleopatra  was  a  com- 
parative failure  and  was  soon  dropped  from  her 
repertoire,  and  though  her  Viola  was  to  a  degree 
lacking  in  high  spirits — were  charming  and 
technically  admirable  impersonations. 

In  the  Greek  Theatre  of  the  University  of 


356      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

California  at  Berkeley,  Miss  Anglin  lias  acted 
four  of  the  classic  dramas  of  ancient  Greece, 
— the  Antigone  and  the  Electra  of  Sophocles, 
the  Iphigenia  in  Auris  and  the  Medea  of  Euri- 
pides. Though  her  training  and  her  speech 
have  always  been  primarily  those  of  the  modern 
actress,  she  has  revealed  in  these  classic  trag- 
edies a  simplicity  of  method  and  an  authority  of 
voice  and  presence  that  few  actresses,  either  of 
England  or  America,  could  equal.  With  Miss 
Lilian  McCarthy  presenting  so  beautifully  the 
women  of  Greek  tragedy  at  one  end  of  the  coun- 
try, and  Miss  Anglin  at  the  other,  the  classics 
have  had  a  day  of  real,  if  brief,  glory. 

If  the  roster  of  American  actresses  is  given 
a  cosmopolitan  aspect  by  the  inclusion  of  the 
names  of  Edith  Wynne  Matthison,  Martha  Hed- 
man,  Hedwig  Eeicher  and  Bertha  Kalich,  all  of 
whom  lived  many  years  in  Europe,  the  most 
striking  example  of  all  is  Alia  Nazimova.3 
She  was  born  in  Russia,  went  to  school  in  Swit- 
zerland, studied  the  violin  at  Odessa,  the  drama 
in  Moscow,  and  after  a  few  years'  apprentice- 
ship in  her  native  land  and  a  year  at  St.  Peters- 
burg, she  acted  with  Paul  OrleneiPs  company 
(of  course,  in  Russian)  in  London.  Coming 
then  to  America  she  played  a  season  in  Russian 
with  her  compatriots;  and  then,  in  June,  1906, 
having  signed  a  contract  to  act  in  English  in 
November  of  the  same  year,  she  set  herself  to 
the  mastery  of  the  new  language,  much  as  Mod- 

3  Alia  Nazimova  was  born  at  Yalta,  Crimea,  Russia,  June  4, 
1879. 


AMERICAN  ACTRESSES  OF  TODAY      357 

jeska  had  done  thirty  years  before.  She  kept 
her  word,  and  when  the  appointed  time  came 
she  acted  Hedda  Gabler,  which  she  followed  dur- 
ing the  next  half-dozen  years,  with  others  of 
Ibsen's  plays:  A  Doll's  House,  The  Master 
Builder,  Little  Eyolf,  as  well  as  several  other 
plays,  like  The  Comet,  The  Marionettes,  and 
Bella  Donna,  in  none  of  which  the  actress  pos- 
sessed the  significance  that  marked  her  when 
she  confined  herself  to  Ibsen. 

To  play  first  in  an  obscure  hall  on  the  lower 
East  Side,  then  in  two  or  three  scarcely  less  ob- 
scure theatres,  and  then,  a  year  and  a  half  after 
her  unheralded  arrival,  to  act  in  a  new  tongue 
in  one  of  New  York's  leading  theatres — it  all 
makes  one  of  the  most  dramatic  of  careers.  If, 
however,  Nazimova  is  "a  tigress  in  the  leash  of 
art,"  as  Julius  Huneker  called  her,  an  artist 
must  hold  the  leash,  or  it  becomes  too  much  a 
circus  tigress,  going  through  the  expected  tricks, 
but  in  a  cage  of  which  she  is  always  conscious. 
Nazimova  did  us  a  real  service  in  her  vivid 
impersonation  of  Ibsen's  heroines.  Mrs.  Fiske 
apart,  no  one  else  has  done  much  for  Ibsen  in 
this  country.  But  apparently  she  cannot  go  on 
playing  Ibsen  profitably;  her  art,  which  "  ex- 
presses itself  in  a  continual  physical  virtuosity 
which  startles  and  thrills,"  does  not  find  an  out- 
let in  the  sort  of  play  English  and  American 
dramatists  are  likely  to  write ;  and,  as  Mr.  Ruhl 
points  out, '  '  of  late  she  has  drifted  far  from  her 
simpler  beginnings  and  over-accented  the  more 
exotic  side  of  her  personality  as  if  determined 


358      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

to  'run  it  into  the  ground.'  Like  another  ac- 
tress of  striking  talent,  Xance  O'Xeil,  Madame 
Xazimova  is  idle  chiefly  because  she  and  the 
dramatists  seem  unable  to  meet  on  a  common 
ground. 

The  case  for  the  poetic  actress  is  little  better. 
After  acquiring  in  England  a  thorough  ground- 
ing in  her  profession,  Edith  Wynne  Matthison  4 
came  to  America  in  1903  and  played  Everyman 
with  a  dignity,  a  charm  of  voice  and  person,  and 
a  poetic  poignancy  that  made  the  fifteenth-cen- 
tury " morality"  forever  memorable  for  any  one 
who  saw  it.  After  brief  experiments  with 
Viola,  Portia,  and  Kate  Hardcastle,  she  re- 
turned to  England,  and  then,  after  dividing  the 
intervening  years  between  her  old  home  and  her 
new,  she  settled  more  or  less  permanently  in 
America  in  1910,  when  she  joined  the  company 
of  the  Xew  Theatre.  She  must  be  regarded  as 
of  the  American  theatre. 

Miss  Matthison  is  preeminently  a  poetic  ac- 
tress. Her  moods  and  methods,  her  rich  and 
tender  voice,  her  whole  training  and  personality 
fit  her  rarely  for  the  realization  of  the  heroines 
of  poetic  drama.  How  truly  this  is  not  the  age 
of  the  poetic  drama,  however,  is  shown  by  the 
short  list  of  roles — outside  of  Shakespeare's 
heroines — that  Miss  Matthison  has  had,  at  once 
adapted  to  her  and  worthy  of  her  talents.  At  the 
Xew  Theatre  she  played  Sister  Beatrice  in  Mae- 
terlinck's play  of  that  name,  The  Piper,  and 

*  Edith  Wynne  Matthison  was  born  at  Birmingham,  Eng- 
land. 


AMERICAN  ACTRESSES  OF  TODAY      359 

Light  in  The  Blue  Bird.  And  the  New  Theatre 
was  not  wholly  a  response  to  public  taste ;  it  was 
largely  an  attempt  to  foster  it.  For  the  rest, 
Miss  Matthison's  American  appearances  (and 
her  English  experience  was  similar)  have  been 
distributed  among  many  plays  of  many  kinds, 
some  of  them  excellent,  like  The  Great  Divide 
and  The  Servant  in  the  House,  but  all  of 
them  rather  beside  the  point,  so  far  as  Miss 
Matthison's  peculiar  talent  was  concerned. 
When  she  played,  and  beautifully  played,  An- 
dromache in  Mr.  Barker's  recent  production  of 
The  Trojan  Women,  she  again  came  briefly  into 
her  own. 

If  Miss  Anglin  and  Miss  Matthison  almost 
exhaust  our  list  of  first-rate  poetic  actresses 
(now  that  Miss  Marlowe  has  retired),  the  case 
is  far  otherwise  with  the  comediennes.  There 
are  two,  at  least, — Grace  George  and  Laura 
Hope  Crews, — who  are  practiced  adepts,  thor- 
oughly at  home  arnid  the  subtleties  of  high 
comedy. 

The  place  of  Miss  George  5  among  American 
actresses  is  only  partly  indicated  by  the  an- 
nouncement that  she  is  to  direct  her  own  theatre 
in  New  York.  Though  she  merits  that  distinc- 
tion, it  is  one  that  is  easily  within  the  grasp  of 
the  wife  of  William  A.  Brady.  But  it  is  in- 
deed something  to  be  one  of  our  few  actresses 
who  are  mistresses  of  comedy.  Miss  George 
made  her  first  appearance  on  the  professional 

s  Grace  George  was  born  at  New  York  City,  December  25, 
1879. 


360       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

stage  (she  had  previously  acted  much  as  an 
amateur)  as  long  ago  as  1894,  but  it  was  not 
until  1907,  when  she  acted  Cyprienne  in  Di- 
vorQons,  that  she  disclosed  her  talent  brought 
to  its  fullness  by  long  and  varied  training. 
Playing  with  her  in  Divorgons  was  that  excel- 
lent actor,  Frank  Worthing,  and  the  effect  pro- 
duced by  them  remains  one  of  the  memorable 
incidents  of  American  acting.6  During  the 
dozen  years  that  preceded  Divorgons  and  again 
during  the  period  that  has  followed,  Miss 
George  has  been  condemned  to  play  in  a  long 
succession  of  comparatively  inferior  plays. 
The  list  is  varied  only  occasionally  by  brief  ap- 
pearances in  genuine  high  comedy,  such  as  her 
Lady  Teazle  in  The  School  for  Scandal  at  the 
New  Theatre  and  her  Beatrice  in  Much  Ado 
About  Nothing.  Taking  it  all  in  all,  she  is  best 
represented,  so  far,  by  her  Cyprienne,  an 
admirable  impersonation,  compact  with  rich 
humor,  naturalness  and  charm, — and  achieve- 
ment in  real  comedy.  Miss  George  promises 
to  come  into  her  own,  however,  with  the  opening 
of  the  theatre  in  New  York  of  which  she  is  to 
be  the  guiding  spirit  and  the  chief  actress,  for, 
if  promise  fails  not,  it  is  to  be  a  rigorously 
guarded  home  of  nothing  but  the  best  in  the 
realm  of  comedy. 

Like  Miss  George,  Laura  Hope  Crews 7  has 
earned  by  long  training  and  by  brilliant  ac- 

«  Following  the  American  production,  Miss  George  played 
DivorQons  in  London. 

i  Laura  Hope  Crews  was  born  at  San  Francisco. 


AMERICAN  ACTRESSES  OF  TODAY      361 

complishment  the  admiration  she  now  wins. 
She  had  been  a  child  actress  in  the  far  West, 
and,  returning  to  the  stage  in  her  'teens,  had 
undergone  the  rigorous  training  of  stock  com- 
pany work  in  San  Francisco  and  New  York  for 
a  half  dozen  years  before  she  attracted  any 
considerable  notice.  Such  an  experience  in 
American  stock  companies,  with  weekly  changes 
of  bill,  means  either  a  sinking  to  a  dead  level 
of  mechanical  acting,  or  a  constantly  enlarging 
technical  resource.  The  latter  was  the  case 
with  Miss  Crews.  As  Mr.  Eaton  has  pointed 
out,  though  she  has  come  to  be  looked  upon  as 
an  actress  of  such  sunny  parts  as  Polly  in  The 
Great  Divide,  and  the  whimsical  heroine  of  Her 
Husband's  Wife,  it  is  because  Miss  Crews  for 
so  long  went  from  such  plays  as  Hoyt's  A  Bunch 
of  Keys,  to  others  like  Magda  and  Hedda  Gab- 
ler  that  she  is  today  not  merely  an  attractive 
personality,  but  an  actress  of  complete  technical 
equipment.  Such  she  has  again  proved  herself 
to  be  by  the  finesse  of  her  impersonation  of  the 
wife  in  The  Phantom  Rival.  By  virtue  of  the 
power  of  consistent  impersonation  which  she 
brings  to  bear  upon  her  warmly  human  heroines, 
her  high  spirits  and  her  thoroughly  trained  re- 
sources of  humorous  suggestion,  she  has  earned 
a  high  place  as  a  comedienne;  but  the  sincerity 
and  the  variety  of  her  art  would  equip  her  at  a 
moment's  notice  to  revert  to  the  emotional  hero- 
ines of  a  more  sober  drama. 

It  is  becoming  too  apparent  that  we  have  seen 
the  last  of  the  charming  and  delicate  art  of 


362       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Annie  Eussell;  the  physical  power  and  the 
emotional  intensity  of  Nance  0 'Neil's  very  real 
talent  find  their  expression  only  in  plays  of  a 
Bernhardtian  type  that  to  a  great  extent  has 
gone  out  of  fashion  on  the  American  stage; 
Eose  Stahl,  after  a  long  career  as  America's 
best  stock  actress,  leaped  into  international 
fame  by  a  single  masterpiece  of  characteriza- 
tion (in  The  Chorus  Lady)  which  she  has  not 
since  had  an  occasion  to  duplicate;  and  the 
charming  and  well-grounded  acting  ability  of 
Henrietta  Crosman,  always  condemned  to  deal 
with  second-rate  plays,  seems  to  have  run  its 
course,  so  far  as  the  public  is  concerned. 

To  replace  these  and  the  other  actresses  8  who 
have  dropped  from  the  ranks  of  active  service, 
or  who  will,  before  many  years  pass,  do  so,  there 
is,  as  we  have  said,  no  lack  of  younger  women. 
A  stage  that  can  count  upon  Helen  Ware,  Mar- 
garet Illington,  Emma  Dunn,  Elsie  Ferguson, 
Emily  Stevens,  Frances  Starr,  Jane  Cowl, 
Martha  Hedman,  Doris  Keane,  Laurette  Taylor, 

8  Besides  Miss  Russell,  Miss  O'Neil,  Miss  Stahl  and  Miss 
Crosman,  these  are  some  of  the  American  actresses  of  the 
closing  years  of  the  nineteenth  century  and  the  early  years  of 
the  twentieth  century,  who  merit  more  notice  than  can  be 
given  them  here,  but  whose  achievements  are  recorded  in  the 
books  named  in  the  bibliography:  Viola  Allen,  Julia  Arthur, 
Blanche  Bates,  Amelia  Bingham,  Clara  Bloodgood,  Mrs.  Leslie 
Carter,  Rose  Coghlan,  Ida  Conquest,  Maxine  Elliott,  Virginia 
Harned,  Isabel  Irving,  May  Irwin,  Mary  Mannering,  Clara 
Morris,  Eleanor  Robson,  Effie  Shannon,  Mary  Shaw  and  Blanche 
Walsh.  Some  in  this  list,  like  Miss  Irwin,  Miss  Coghlan  and 
Miss  Shannon,  are,  happily,  still  active.  And  Miss  Arthur 
announces  her  return  to  the  stage. 


AMERICAN  ACTRESSES  OF  TODAY      363 

Irene  Fenwick,  and  Florence  Keed  is  suffering 
no  weakness  on  its  distaff  side.  If  only  our  ac- 
complished young  actors  were  as  numerous! 
For  each  of  these  women  is  more  than  a  mere 
personality — she  is  a  real  actress,  mistress  of 
the  tools  of  her  trade. 

Like  Miss  Anglin,  Margaret  Illington  learned 
the  rudiments  of  her  art  in  a  dramatic  school. 
Coming  then  from  Chicago  to  New  York,  she 
was  immediately  engaged  by  Daniel  Frohman 
for  a  part  in  The  Pride  of  Jennico.  That  was 
fifteen  years  ago,  and  it  would  be  beside  the 
point  to  rank  her  with  those  who  are,  compara- 
tively, untried  beginners.  Miss  Illington  is  a 
practiced  player  with  more  than  a  score  of  ex- 
cellent impersonations  to  her  credit;  of  which 
Mrs.  Leffingwell  in  Mrs.  I/effing  well's  Boots, 
Nina  Jesson  in  His  House  in  Order,  Marie  Voy- 
sin  in  The  Thief,  Maggie  Schultz  in  Kindling, 
and  Elinor  Shale  in  The  Lie  are  merely  the  out- 
standing names.  But  she  is  still  young  and  she 
is  one  of  those  who  can  be  counted  on  to  carry 
on  the  torch  for  years  to  come.  "Miss  Illing- 
ton leaves  no  delicate  nuance  of  expression  un- 
touched, "  has  been  written  of  her.  "She  has 
great  vitality  and  physical  beauty;  she  has  a 
perfectly  secure  and  accurate  dramatic  instinct. 
...  In  two  of  the  finest  moments  [of  The  Lie] 
Miss  Illington  rises  to  tragic  heights.  In  all 
of  the  lighter  scenes  she  is  deliciously  youth- 
ful and  piquant.  .  .  .  Fleeting  glimpses  of 
humor  and  enfolding  sweetness,  and  then  the 
big  frantic  outbursts  of  righteous  anger  and 


364       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

superb  accusations."  In  a  part  of  quite 
another  sort,  the  harassed  wife  in  Kindling, 
Miss  Illington  "  acted  the  ignorant,  dumbly 
struggling,  desperate  mother  truly,  simply, 
touchingly. ' ' 

Miss  Ferguson  is  a  graduate  of  the  musical 
comedy  chorus,  and,  for  an  actress  who  shows 
so  much  ability,  her  dramatic  training  has  been 
brief.  Only  a  half  dozen  roles  had  followed  her 
chorus-girls  days  when  she  was  given  a  part  in 
Such  a  Little  Queen.  She  was  not  a  star  when 
the  play  was  produced,  but  not  many  days  had 
gone  by  when  her  managers  boldly,  and  perhaps 
prematurely,  elevated  her  to  starship.  Her 
beauty  and  intelligence  went  far  to  justify  her 
promotion,  and  when  the  pleasantries  of  Such  a 
Little  Queen  and  The  First  Lady  of  the  Land 
were  followed  by  the  greater  complexities  of 
The  Strange  Woman  and  Outcast,  it  became 
plain  that  Miss  Ferguson's  emotional  truth  and 
sense  of  impersonation  could  be  those  of  only  a 
genuine  actress.  The  intellectual  note  that  is 
strong  in  her  work,  and  the  fluency,  versatility 
and  certainty  of  the  technique  that  she  has 
somehow  acquired  in  her  short  career,  make  her 
the  most  promising  of  our  younger  actresses. 

Like  Miss  Ferguson,  Miss  Stevens  is  beauti- 
ful, and  alive  to  the  finger-tips  with  the  keen  in- 
telligence of  the  modern  American  woman  at  her 
best.  Excellent  training  in  her  distinguished 
cousin's  company  she  has  followed  by  pleasing 
performances  of  Emmy  in  Septimus  and  Anne 
in  Man  and  Superman,  but  of  late  the  plays  to 


AMERICAN  ACTRESSES  OF  TODAY      365 

which  she  has  been  assigned, — like  The  Child 
and  The  Garden  of  Paradise,  have  failed  so 
lamentably  that  the  light  of  her  talent  is  in  tem- 
porary eclipse. 

In  Helen  Ware,  America  has  an  actress  who, 
though  her  art,  as  so  far  revealed,  is  compara- 
tively limited  in  scope,  is  in  the  very  first  rank 
of  impersonators  of  highly-colored  "character" 
parts  and  of  the  masterful  women  of  modern 
melodrama.  Her  vivid  gypsy  girl  in  The  Road 
to  Yesterday  impressed  American  theatregoers 
when  she  had  been  on  the  stage  a  half-dozen 
years,  and  since  then  her  work  in  The  Third 
Degree,  The  Woman  and  Within  The  Law  have 
more  than  reenforced  that  impression.  She  is 
an  utterly  sincere  actress,  who  plans  and  exe- 
cutes her  characterizations  with  admirable  and 
convincing  consistency. 

Emma  Dunn's  succession  of  perfectly  limned 
stage  portraits  of  elderly  women;  Frances 
Starr's  achievements  as  Laura  Murdock  in 
The  Easiest  Way  and  as  Dorothy  in  The 
Case  of  Becky;  Jane  Cowl's  Mary  Turner 
in  Within  The  Law,  an  impersonation  that  took 
Miss  Cowl  at  a  single  bound  almost  to  the  side 
of  Helen  Ware;  the  beautifully  feminine  and 
intelligent  acting — in  an  acquired  tongue — of 
Martha  Hedman,  who  has  come  to  us  from  Swe- 
den; the  charmingly  restrained  and  skillful 
work  of  Florence  Reed  in  The  Yellow  Ticket; 
Doris  Keane  's  admirably  lifelike  and  subtle  im- 
personation of  a  prima  donna  of  the  sixties  in 
Romance;  Irene  Fenwick's  vivid  Lily  Kardos 


366       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

in  The  Song  of  Songs,  and  Lanrette  Taylor 's 
exotic  princess  in  The  Bird  of  Paradise,  and  her 
delightfully  human,  humorously  pathetic,  inter- 
nationally memorable  Peg; — these  have  hardly 
had  time  to  become  memories.  Surely,  so  far 
as  actresses  are  concerned,  our  stage  is  richly 
endowed.  And  not  only  with  native  talent. 
Hedwig  Keicher,  of  German  birth  and  training 
and  an  excellent  actress  of  Ibsen's  heroines,  and 
Bertha  Kalich,  who  was  born  in  Austria  and 
acted  in  New  York  in  Yiddish,  have  both  adopted 
America  and  the  English  tongue  and,  like  Alia 
Nazimova  and  Martha  Hedman,  must  hence- 
forth be  counted  among  America's  actresses. 
Mimi  Aguglia  is  living  in  our  midst,  and  acts  in 
Italian  when,  all  too  rarely,  opportunity  pre- 
sents itself. 

As  for  visitors  from  England,  Marie  Tempest, 
Mrs.  Patrick  Campbell  and  Gertrude  Elliott  are 
almost  as  familiarly  known  in  this  country  as 
at  home;  the  girlish  charm  of  Phyllis  Neilson- 
Terry,  and  the  ample  art  of  Lillah  McCarthy, 
who  is  equal  alike  to  the  exacting  demands  of 
Greek  tragedy  and  Shavian  satire,  it  has  re- 
cently been  the  privilege  of  America  to  witness ; 
Mary  Forbes  is  a  newcomer,  an  actress  skilled 
in  both  poetic  drama  and  realistic  plays ;  and  the 
too  rare  visits  of  the  Irish  Players  have  given  us 
the  pungent  and  stimulating  art  of  Sara  All- 
good. 

This  chapter,  or  rather  this  list, — it  could  be 
little  more  with  so  many  ladies  clamoring  for 
their  deserved  attention, — has  at  least  made  one 


AMERICAN  ACTRESSES  OF  TODAY      367 

thing  clear.  On  the  feminine  side  of  the  art  of 
acting,  the  only  art  in  which  women  compete 
with  men  on  more  than  even  terms,  the  Ameri- 
can stage  is  in  a  healthy  condition.  It  has  been 
said,  often  with  cynical  emphasis,  that  in  Amer- 
ica the  audiences  of  women  condition  the  whole 
art  of  the  drama.  But  it  is  not  only  at  the  box- 
office  that  women  outweigh  the  men  in  their 
share  in  our  theatre. 


APPENDIX 

THE  FIRST  ENGLISH  ACTRESSES,  AND  THE 

CHANGE  IN  THE  ACTOR'S  SOCIAL 

STATUS 

The  actress,  as  an  established  element  in  the  thea- 
tre, is  comparatively  modern.  The  English  stage 
had  been  a  flourishing  public  institution  for  some- 
thing more  than  a  century  when,  in  the  first  years  of 
the  Restoration,  veritable  women  began  regularly  to 
replace  those  lads  and  beardless  men  who  in  Shake- 
speare's day  enacted  stage  heroines. 

There  are,  to  be  sure,  fleeting  glimpses  of  women 
acting  in  England  much  earlier  in  the  seventeenth 
century,  while  boys  were  regularly  playing  women's 
parts.  King  James  spent  immense  sums  on  his  court 
revels,  and  his  Queen,  Anne,  was  both  actress  and 
manager — no  doubt  with  much  professional  coaching. 
In  1625— the  first  year  of  the  reign  of  Charles  I— 
there  was  a  merry  round  of  plays  acted  at  Hampton 
Court  at  Christmas  time.  "The  demoiselles," — who, 
as  Doran  surmises,  were  probably  the  maids  of  honor 
— "mean  to  present  a  French  pastoral  wherein  the 
Queen  is  a  principal  actress."1  Thus  the  first  ac- 
tresses in  England  were  amateurs,  and  among  them 
were  two  Queens  of  the  Realm!  Henrietta  Maria 
was,  of  course,  French,  and  it  was  due  to  this  fact, 
and  to  her  liking  for  the  stage,  that  actresses  from 
France  came  to  London2 — doubtless  the  first  pro- 

i  Rutland  to  Nethersole.  21629. 

368 


APPENDIX  369 

fessional  actresses  to  appear  there.  The  fashion — or 
rather  the  obvious  advantages — of  the  acting  of 
women's  parts  by  women  appears  to  have  commended 
itself  much  earlier  on  the  continent  than  in  England. 
1  'They  have  now,"  contemptuously  says  Prynne, — 
the  author  of  Histrio-Mastix  (1633)  and  the  theatre's 
best  hater, — "  their  female  players  in  Italy  and  other 
foreign  parts. ' ' 3 

The  French  actresses  who  came  to  act  at  Blackfri- 
ars  may  have  pleased  their  countrywoman,  the  Queen. 
But  they  seem  to  have  had,  on  the  whole,  a  rather 
hard  time.  "Glad  am  I  to  say,"  wrote  Thomas 
Brand,  another  stout  Puritan,  "they  were  hissed, 
hooted,  and  pippin-pelted  from  the  stage,  so  that  I 
do  not  think  they  will  soon  be  ready  to  try  the  same 
again."  Prynne  was  furiously  abusive.  He  calls 
the  actresses  by  a  variety  of  names,  of  which  "mon- 
sters" is  one  of  the  mildest. 

But  to  some  extent,  the  idea  had  taken  root,  and 
during  the  ten  years  before  the  closing  of  the  theatres, 
in  1642,  women  occasionally  replaced  the  boys  and 
men  who  passed  for  heroines.  In  The  Court  Beggar, 
a  play  enacted  in  London  in  1632,  one  of  the  charac- 
ters, Lady  Strangelove,  says:  "The  boy's  a  pretty 
actor,  and  his  mother  can  play  her  part.  The  women 
now  are  in  great  request."  These  early  actresses 
were,  however,  not  regularly  employed,  their  names 
have  not  come  down  to  us,  and  it  is  correct  to  say 

s  Women  acted  in  Italy  as  early  as  1560,  and  actresses 
appeared  in  France  probably  not  much  later.  The  earliest 
French  actress  of  whom  there  is  definite  record  is  Marie 
Vernier,  who  acted  in  Paris,  in  her  husband's  company,  in 
1599.  In  Spain  the  practice  of  substituting  boys  and  men  in 
women's  parts  seems  never  to  have  obtained.  Going  back 
to  antiquity,  it  is  to  be  noted  that  while  the  Greeks  never 
tolerated  actresses  on  their  stage,  in  Rome  occasional  women 
players  were  by  no  means  unknown. 


370      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

that  professional  English  actresses  appear  for  the  first 
time,  when,  in  1660,  the  theatres  were  reopened,  after 
their  eighteen  years'  suppression  by  the  Puritans.4 

There  were  two  companies,  Killigrew's  and  D'Ave- 
nant's.  Each  had  its  regularly  enrolled  actresses, 
whose  names  are  recorded.  Among  them  were  Mrs. 
Corey,  Mrs.  Hughes,  Mrs.  Knipp,  the  Marshall  sisters, 
Mrs.  Davenport,  Mrs.  Saunderson,  and,  a  little  later, 
Nell  Gwynn. 

No  one,  however,  took  the  trouble  to  make  certain 
for  posterity  the  name  of  the  first  of  them  to  appear. 
We  know  that  she  played  Desdemona,  in  an  adapta- 
tion of  Othello,  called  The  Moor  of  Venice;  that  she 
was  of  Killigrew's  company;  that  the  date  was  De- 
cember 8,  1660,  and  the  place  the  Red  Bull ;  and  that 
Thomas  Jordan  wrote  for  the  occasion  "A  Prologue, 
to  introduce  the  first  woman  that  came  to  act  on  our 
stage. ' '  But  who  the  actress  was  is  not  known.  Two 
names  are  the  likeliest:  Margaret  Hughes,  and  Anne 
Marshall.  Mrs.  Hughes  was  "more  remarkable  for 
her  beauty  than  for  her  great  ability."  "A  mighty 
pretty  woman,"  says  Pepys  of  her,  "and  seems,  but 
is  not,  modest."  She  was  married  later  to  Prince 
Rupert,  and  brought  him  to  the  verge  of  bankruptcy. 
Anne  Marshall,  the  other  chief  claimant,  was  a  com- 
petent actress  of  the  day,  remarkable  chiefly  for  being 
the  daughter  of  a  prominent  Presbyterian  clergyman. 

At  first  the  old  practice  of  giving  the  women's  parts 
to  boys  threatened  to  survive,  alongside  the  new  cus- 

*  In  the  interim  D'Avenant  had  ingeniously  circumvented 
the  restrictions  placed  by  Cromwell's  government  on  the 
theatres,  by  devising  a  species  of  opera.  They  were  really 
plays,  in  the  grand  style,  modeled  after  Italian  pieces,  and 
with  a  musical  accompaniment  to  take  the  curse  off.  In  one 
of  these,  The  Siege  of  Rhodes,  performed  in  1656,  two 
women,  Mrs.  Edward  Coleman  and  another,  played  lanthe 
and  Roxalana. 


APPENDIX  371 

torn  of  employing  women.  For  a  few  years  both 
played  the  heroines,  but  the  race  of  actors  who  could 
portray  women  was  fast  dying  out  and,  owing  to  a 
changed  public  opinion,  was  not  replenished.6  When, 
in  1663,  the  King  granted  patents  to  Killigrew  and 
D'Avenant,  those  managers  were  virtually  instructed 
to  employ  none  but  women  to  represent  female  char- 
acters: " Whereas" — the  royal  patents  read, — "the 
women's  parts  in  plays  have  hitherto  been  acted  by 
men  in  the  habits  of  women,  at  which  some  have  taken 
offense,  we  do  give  leave  that  for  the  time  to  come  all 
women 's  parts  be  acted  by  women. "  In  a  year  or  so 
the  "boy-actresses"  had  virtually  disappeared  from 
the  stage. 

Our  old  friend  Pepys  had  the  pleasure, — undoubt- 
edly a  keen  one  for  him, — of  seeing  some  of  the  earli- 
est appearances  of  actresses  in  London.  We  have  it 
from  him  that  in  1661  he  saw  women  acting  in  Beau- 
mont and  Fletcher's  Beggar's  Bush.  If  he  was  pres- 
ent at  the  Red  Bull  on  the  eighth  of  the  previous 
December,  when  the  first  English  actress  walked  on, 
he  strangely  omits  to  say  so. 

c  Thomas  Jordan's   prologue   shows   that  the   "boys"   were 
now  sometimes  dangerously  near  middle  age: 
"Our  'women'  are  defective,  and  so  sized, 
You'd   think    they    were    some    of    the    guard    disguised ; 
For,  to  speak  truth,  men   act,  that  are  between 
Forty  and  fifty,  wenches  of  fifteen; 
With  bone  so  large,  and  nerve  so  incompliant, 
When  you  call  DESDEMONA,  enter  GIANT." 
"Old   Chetwood  tells  a   story  which  amply   illustrates   the 
absurdity  of  the  'men-actresses.'     King  Charles  II,   he   says, 
coming  to  the  theatre  to  see  Hamlet  and  being  kept  waiting 
for  some  time,  sent  the  Earl  of  Rochester  behind  to  see  what 
was   causing   the   delay.     He   returned   with    the   information 
that  'the  Queen  was  not  quite  shaved.'     'Odsfish!'   said  the 
King.     'I    beg    her    Majesty's    pardon.     We'll    wait    till    her 
barber  has  done  with  her.' " — Lowe's  Betterton. 


372       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Something  should  be  said  of  the  changing  condi- 
tions in  the  actress'  calling  since  1660.  As  we  all 
know,  the  complete  social  recognition  of  actors  and 
actresses  is  distinctly  modern.  Of  course,  in  the  na- 
ture of  things,  they  were  always  the  objects  of  accla- 
mation and  often  admiration;  but  they  were  long  in 
attaining  real  public  respect,  strange  as  that  seems  to 
an  actor- worshiping  (or  especially  actress- worship- 
ing) age. 

There  was  plenty  of  historical  background  for  the 
old  state  of  things.  The  ancients  loved  their  theatre, 
but  their  actors  did  not,  as  a  rule,  rank  high  in  pub- 
lic estimation.  According  to  Cicero,  at  one  time  any 
Roman  who  turned  actor  was  disincorporated  and  un- 
naturalized  by  order  of  the  Censors;  and  Livy  states 
that  players  were  not  thought  good  enough  for  com- 
mon soldiers.  The  early  Christians  maintained  the 
same  attitude,  probably  with  better  reason,  for  in 
their  day  the  drama  fell  into  a  parlous  state.  The 
two  councils  of  Aries  excommunicated  all  players, 
and  in  A.  D.  424  another  church  council  declared  that 
"the  testimony  of  people  of  ill-reputation,  of  players, 
and  others  of  such  scandalous  employments,  shall  not 
be  admitted  against  any  person." 

With  the  rise  of  the  wonderful  Elizabethan  drama 
in  England  the  actors  attained  a  measure  of  respect, 
mixed,  however,  with  a  certain  condescension.6  Later 

e  As  seems  clear,  for  instance,  from  Hamlet's  unusual 
consideration  of  them.  The  often-quoted  law  enacted  in  the 
reigns  of  Elizabeth  and  James  seems,  however,  to  have  been 
directed  not  against  the  established  city  companies,  but 
against  the  wandering  country  players.  It  reads,  quaintly 
enough:  "All  bear-wards,  common  players  of  interludes, 
counterfeit  Egyptians,  etc.,  shall  be  taken,  adjudged,  and 
deemed  Rogues  and  Vagabonds  and  Sturdy  Beggars,  and 
shall  sustain  all  pain  and  punishment  as  by  this  act  is  in  that 
behalf  appointed."  For  a  resume"  of  the  phases  of  the  actor's 


APPENDIX  373 

in  the  seventeenth  century,  when  actresses  began  reg- 
ularly to  appear  on  the  English  stage,  the  actor 's 
standing  was  at  least  no  better.  William  Mountford, 
a  respectable  actor,  one  of  the  most  accomplished  of 
his  day,  was  killed  in  a  street  brawl  by  Lord  Mohun 
and  Captain  Hill,  two  dissolute  "  gentlemen/ '  who 
were  attempting  to  abduct  the  renowned  actress,  Anne 
Bracegirdle.  Mohun  was  tried  in  1692  by  the  House 
of  Lords,  and  though  he  was  flagrantly  guilty,  he  was 
acquitted,  69  to  14.  During  the  hearing  one  noble- 
man could  not  understand  why  so  great  a  fuss  should 
be  made  about  so  small  a  matter  and  said  that  "  after 
all,  the  fellow  was  but  a  player,  and  players  are 
rogues."  And  of  the  period  immediately  following, 
John  Fyvie  says:  "In  the  earlier  part  of  the 
eighteenth  century  anybody  might  insult  an  actor  with 
impunity ;  and  if  an  actor  were  thrashed  by  a  person 
of  quality  neither  he  nor  anybody  else  would  have 
dreamed  that  he  had  any  right  to  retaliate. ' ' 7 

Dr.  Johnson's  comments  have  been  quoted  as  typi- 
fying the  attitude  which  even  in  Garrick's  day,  a  man 
of  intellect  could  maintain  toward  the  player's  pro- 
fession,8 though  it  is  to  be  noted  that  not  even  in  the 

lack  of  social  position  see  John  Fyvie's  "Comedy  Queens  of 
the  Eighteenth  Century." 

7  "Of  course,  in  the  theatrical  profession,  as  in  every  other, 
there  have  always  been  exceptional  individuals  whose  char- 
acters and  abilities  (especially  if  they  managed  to  acquire  a 
little  wealth)  have  raised  them  into  the  highest  society  of 
their  time.  But  in  the  case  of  actors  it  was  always  quite 
apparent  that  they  were  only  there  in  sufferance,  and  were 
tolerated  because  they  were  amusing.  It  was  thought  a 
stinging  satire,  for  example,  when  'Junius/  incidentally  ad- 
dressing Garrick,  wrote:  'Now  mark  me,  vagabond;  keep  to 
your  pantomimes  or  be  assured  you  shall  hear  of  it.' " 

s  "Goldsmith  having  said,  that  Garrick's  compliment  to  the 
Queen,  which  he  introduced  into  the  play  of  The  Chances, 
which  he  had  altered  and  revised  this  year,  was  mean  and 


374       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Doctor's  distinguished  circle  were  his  prejudices  gen- 
erally shared.  And  Johnson  himself,  it  will  be  re- 
membered, felt  honored  to  receive  a  visit  from  the 
celebrated  Mrs.  Siddons.  "At  all  periods  of  his  life, 
Johnson  used  to  talk  contemptuously  of  players," 
says  Boswell,  l '  for  which,  perhaps  there  was  formerly 
too  much  reason  from  the  licentious  and  dissolute 
manners  of  those  engaged  in  that  profession.  It  is 
but  justice  to  add/'  Boswell  goes  on,  "that  in  our 
own  time  such  a  change  has  taken  place,  that  there  is 
no  longer  room  for  such  an  unfavorable  distinc- 
tion." 

A  century  had,  indeed,  seen  a  change.  In  1660, 
when  actresses  invaded  the  theatre,  there  was  a  long 
road  to  travel  before  the  actor  could  be  thought  of  as 
he  is  today, — innocent  of  social  stigma  until  proved 
guilty.  It  was  then  the  other  way  about, — he  be- 

gross  flattery;  Johnson:  '.  .  .  as  to  meanness  (rising  into 
warmth),  how  is  it  mean  in  a  player — a  showman — a  fellow 
who  exhibits  himself  for  a  shilling,  to  flatter  his  queen?' 
(1773). 

"He  (Foote)  mentioned,  that  an  Irish  gentleman  said  to 
Johnson,  'Sir,  you  have  not  seen  the  best  French  players.' 
Johnson:  'Players,  Sir!  I  look  on  them  as  no  better  than 
creatures  set  upon  tables  and  joint-stools  to  make  faces  and 
produce  laughter,  like  dancing  dogs.' — 'But,  Sir,  you  will 
allow  that  some  players  are  better  than  others?'  Johnson: 
*Yes,  Sir,  as  some  dogs  dance  better  than  others/  (1775). 

"I  wondered  (said  Johnson)  to  find  Richardson  displeased 
that  I  'did  not  treat  Gibber  with  more  respect.  Now,  Sir, 
to  talk  of  respect  for  a  player'  (smiling  disdainfully).  Bos- 
well: 'There,  Sir,  you  are  always  heretical;  you  never  will 
allow  merit  to  a  player.'  Johnson:  'Merit,  Sir,  what  merit? 
Do  you  respect  a  rope-dancer,  or  a  ballad-singer?'  Boswell: 
'No,  Sir;  but  we  respect  a  great  player,  as  a  man  who  can 
conceive  lofty  sentiments,  and  can  express  them  gracefully.' 
Johnson:  'What,  Sir,  a  fellow  who  claps  a  hump  on  his  back, 
and  a  lump  on  his  leg,  and  cries,  "I  am  Richard  the  Third"  ?' " 
(1777).— Boswell's  "Life  of  Johnson." 


APPENDIX  375 

longed  to  an  outcast  class,  until  he  proved  himself  de- 
serving of  exceptional  consideration. 

Naturally,  when  women  came  to  join  the  actors7 
ranks,  they  shared  more  than  to  the  full  the  social 
disadvantages  attaching  to  the  calling,  simply  because 
they  were  women ;  for,  as  is  well  known,  it  is  a  queer 
twist  of  the  ingrained  chivalric  attitude  toward  the 
sex  that  when  a  woman  ranges  herself  with  men  of  a 
doubtful  class  she  is  accorded  a  double  portion  of  the 
disfavor  in  which  that  class  may  be  held.  In  any 
event,  the  first  century  of  English  actresses  saw  them, 
for  the  most  part,  doing  their  best  to  justify  the 
stigma.  Anne  Bracegirdle  was  notorious  in  her  day, 
not  for  lapses  from  virtue,  but  actually  for  leading  a 
measurably  pure  life.  So  singular,  in  her  day,  was 
the  actress  who  was  not  the  mistress  of  some  one  her 
social  superior  that  virtuous  "Bracey"  was  hailed  as 
a  phenomenon.  A  number  of  lords  and  gentlemen 
once  met  round  a  festive  board  and  pledged  a  large 
purse  to  be  offered  to  her  as  a  tribute  to  her  rare 
chastity.9  Her  sister  actresses,  and  many  who  were 
to  follow  in  the  eighteenth  century,  were,  in  many 
instances,  openly  the  mistresses  of  lords  and  other 
' '  fine  gentlemen.  * '  It  seems  superfluous  to  say  of  the 
average  nineteenth  century  actress  that  her  standards 
of  life  were,  in  general,  far  different  from  those  of 
her  earlier  sisters ;  and  the  fact  is  of  much  importance 
in  its  direct  bearing  on  one  of  the  most  interesting 
changes  that  have  occurred  in  the  realm  of  the  thea- 
tre :  the  improvement  in  the  social  status  of  the  actor 
and  actress. 

For  another  cause  of  that  change  we  may  look  to 

»  And  even  of  Bracegirdle,  the  incomparably  virtuous,  cer- 
tain doubts  exist.  Mountford  is  thought  by  some  to  have 
been  a  favored  lover;  and  later  Congreve,  the  poet,  was  ac- 
counted the  actor's  successor. 


376       HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

the  general  dramatic  awakening  that  characterized 
the  latter  part  of  the  nineteenth  century, — the  vi- 
talization  of  the  theatre  as  the  home  of  an  art  worthy 
the  study  and  appreciation  of  the  best  minds.  In  1660 
and  for  many  years  later  the  English-speaking  thea- 
tre, at  least,  was  not  that. 

Until  fairly  recent  times  the  acting  class  was  re- 
cruited mainly  from  those  who  were  either  born  to  it 
or  who  drifted  into  it  more  or  less  as  a  matter  of 
chance.  Here,  too,  the  nineteenth  century  saw  a 
change.  Partly  as  a  cause  and  partly  as  a  result  of 
the  improved  social  standing  of  the  actor,  ambitious 
men  and  women  of  good  family  in  increasing  numbers 
adopted  the  stage  as  a  profession. 

Again,  the  latter-day  recognition  of  the  stage  found 
a  significant  expression,  in  England,  in  the  knighting 
of  a  succession  of  distinguished  actors  and  drama- 
tists: Henry  Irving,  Squire  Bancroft,  Arthur  Wing 
Pinero,  John  Hare,  Charles  "Wyndham,  George  Alex- 
ander, Herbert  Beerbohm  Tree,  Johnston  Forbes- 
Robertson.  In  their  own  country,  and,  as  one  may 
as  well  admit,  in  America  too,  the  knighting  of  actors 
could  not  fail  further  to  dignify  the  calling. 

All  of  these  causes  have  acted  and  interacted, 
through  the  years,  to  help  bring  the  actor  and  the  ac- 
tress to  a  point  of  public  interest  and  esteem  that  is 
reached  by  few  of  the  world's  "authentic  benef ac- 
tors. "  Most  important  of  all,  however,  as  a  cause  of 
their  progress  to  something  very  like  adulation  has 
been  the  increasingly  strong  position  of  the  theatre 
as  the  artistic  meeting  ground  of  all  the  people.  The 
drama  of  1660  was  the  amusement  of  a  restricted 
class;  now  it  is  the  universal  art.  Its  skilled  expo- 
nents, affected  by  a  strong  general  interest,  cannot 
fail  to  receive, — unless  they  willfully  reject  it — the  re- 
spect and  admiration  of  their  contemporaries. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Of  the  large  number  of  books  that  deal,  exclusively 
or  incidentally,  with  theatrical  biography,  the  follow- 
ing may  be  named  as  especially  readable,  and  as  of- 
fering further  reading  in  the  field  covered  by  the 
present  volume: 

Anderson,  Mary,  A  Few  Memories,  New  York,  1896. 

Archer,  William,  The  Theatrical  World,  5  vols.  Lon- 
don, 1893-97. 

Baker,  Henry  Barton,  Our  Old  Actors,  2  vols.  Lon- 
don, 1878, 

Bernhardt,  Sarah,  Memories  of  My  Life,  New  York, 
1907. 

Clapp,  Henry  Austin,  Reminiscences  of  a  Dramatic 
Critic,  Boston,  1902. 

Clapp,  John  Bouve,  and  Edwin  Francis  Edgett,  Play- 
ers of  the  Present,  3  parts.  (In  Dunlap  Society 
Publications.)  New  York,  1899-1901. 

Cook,  Button,  Hours  with  the  Players,  2  vols.  Lon- 
don, 1881. 

Doran,  John,  Annals  of  the  English  Stage,  London, 
1888.  3  vols.  (Edited  and  revised  by  Robert 
W.  Lowe.) 

Eaton,  Walter  Prichard,  At  the  New  Theatre  and 
Others,  Boston,  1910. 

Faxon,  Frederick  W.  (Editor),  The  Dramatic  Index; 
(An  Annual  Index  of  Books  and  Magazine  Arti- 
cles.) Boston,  1908— 

Fyvie,  John,  Comedy  Queens  of  the  Georgian  Era, 
New  York,  1907. 

377 


378      HEROINES  OF  THE  MODERN  STAGE 

Fyvie,  John,  Tragedy  Queens  of  the  Georgian  Era, 
New  York,  1909. 

Huret,  Jules,  Sarah  Bernhardt  (Translated  by  G.  A. 
Raper),  London,  1899. 

Huret,  Jules,  Loges  et  Coulisses,  Paris,  1901. 

Mapes,  Victor,  Duse  and  the  French,  New  York,  1899. 
(In  Dunlap  Society  Publications.) 

Matthews,  Brander,  &  Laurence  Hutton  (Editors), 
Actors  and  Actresses  of  Great  Britain  and  the 
United  States,  5  vols.  New  York,  1886. 

McKay,  Frederic  E.,  &  Charles  E.  L.  Wingate  (Edi- 
tors), Famous  American  Actors  of  To-day,  2  vols. 
New  York,  1896. 

McLeod,  Addison,  Plays  and  Players  in  Modern  Italy, 
London,  1912. 

Modjeska,  Helena,  Memories  and  Impressions,  New 
York,  1910. 

Robins,  Edward,  Echoes  of  the  Playhouse,  New  York, 
1895. 

Robins,  Edward,  Twelve  Great  Actresses,  New  York. 
1900. 

Ruhl,  Arthur,  Second  Nights,  New  York,  1914. 

Scott,  Clement,  Ellen  Terry,  New  York,  1900. 

Shaw,  George  Bernard,  Dramatic  Opinions  and  Es- 
says, 2  vols.  New  York,  1906. 

Simpson,  Harold,  &  Mrs.  Charles  Braun,  A  Century 
of  Famous  Actresses,  London,  1913. 

Strang,  Lewis  C.,  Famous  Actresses  of  the  Day  in 
America,  2  series.  Boston,  1899,  1902. 

Strang,  Lewis  C.,  Players  and  Plays  of  the  Last  Quar- 
ter Century,  2  vols.  Boston,  1903. 

Symons,  Arthur,  Plays,  Acting  and  Music,  London, 
1903. 

Terry,  Ellen,  The  Story  of  My  Life,  New  York,  1908. 

Walkley,  A.  B.,  Playhouse  Impressions,  London,  1892. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY  379 

Winter,  William,  Other  Days,  New  York,  1908. 
Winter,  William,  Shakespeare  on  the  Stage,  2  series. 

New  York,  1911,  1915. 
Winter,  William,  The  Wallet  of  Time,  2  vols.    New 

York,  1913. 


INDEX 


INDEX 


Abbey,  Henry  E.,  26,  29  note, 
246,  247. 

Abington,  Frances,  iii. 

Adams,   Annie,   325. 

Adams,  Maude,  324-46;  par- 
entage and  birth,  325; 
career  as  a  child-actress, 
325-29;  goes  to  New  York, 
329;  with  E.  H.  Sothern, 
330;  A.  Midnight  Bell, 
331;  in  Charles  Frohman's 


ance,  237;  early  trials, 
239-40;  acts  in  eastern 
cities,  242;  goes  abroad, 
244;  her  repertoire,  245 
(note) ;  acts  in  London, 
246-7 ;  her  friendships, 
248;  a  London  ovation, 
252;  distaste  for  the  thea- 
ter, 256-7;  last  appearance 
on  the  stage,  258-9;  mar- 
riage, 260;  her  acting, 
261-2;  her  personality, 
262-3;  269  (note). 


company,       331-2;       John 

Drew's       leading      woman, 

332-34;    becomes  a  "star,"  Angelo,  Mile.,   133. 

334;    The   Little    Minister,  Anglin,  Margaret,  354—6. 

335;     Romeo     and    Juliet,  Antoine,   Andre",    153. 

336;    L'Aiglon,   337;    Peter  Archer,     William,     157,     184 

Pan,    338-9;    What    Every  (note),  202,  221  and  note, 

Woman     Knows,      339-40;  283. 

Chanticler,      340-41;      The  Arliss,   George,   286. 

Maid    of    Orleans,    341-2;  Arnold,  Matthew,  45    (note). 

Miss    Adams    and    Barrie,  Arthur,  Julia,  362   (note). 

342;    her  personality,  343-  Asquith,  Herbert,   318. 

6;      her      repertoire,      333  Augier,   Emile,    139,   150. 


(note),   335    (note);    347. 
Agar,  Marie,    13. 
Aguglia,    Mimi,    366. 
Aiglon,  L\  337. 
Aldrich,  Mildred,  271    (note). 
Alexander,  George,   376. 
Alexandra,  Queen,  49. 
Allen,    Viola,    362     (note). 
Allgood,    Sara,    366. 


Baker,  George  Pierce,  265. 
Bancroft,      Squire     B.,      109, 

111,   376. 
Barrett,  Lawrence,   208,   242, 

247. 

Barrie,  James  M.,  334,  342. 
Barren   Charles,   308. 


Alnia-Tadema,    Laurence,    87,      Barry,  Elizabeth,  iii. 


248. 

Ambigu,  The,  129-30. 
Anderson,      Mary,      230-264 ; 


Barrymore,    Ethel,    350-53. 
Barrymore,      Maurice,       286, 
350. 


parentage,  230;  birth,  231;       Bartet,      Jeanne,      149,      180 
girlhood      and       schooling,  (note). 

232-35;  decides  on  a  stage      Bates,   Blanche,  362    (note), 
career,   236;    first   appear-      Beauplan,  Victor,  136. 
383 


3845 


INDEX 


Beauregard,  General,  240. 

Becky  Sharp,  285. 

Belasco,  David,  327-8. 

Bennett,   Arnold,    166,    168. 

Bernhardt,  Maurice,  13  note, 
32  note,  34. 

Bernhardt  Sarah,  iv,  3-51; 
birth,  5;  schooling,  6-7;  at 
the  Conservatoire,  8-9;  her 
motto,  9;  debut  at  the 
Comedie  Fransaise,  10;  at 
the  Odeon,  11-16;  hospital 
services  during  War  of 
1870,  13;  returns  to  the 
Comedie,  16;  eccentricities, 
19;  her  sculpture,  19,  22; 
acts  in  London,  20-23; 
leaves  the  Comedie,  24; 
first  American  appearance, 
28;  marriage,  31;  world- 
wide tours,  32;  becomes  a 
manager,  33;  the  "Marie 
Colombier"  and  Mme. 
Noirmont  scandals,  34;  the 
Memoirs,  35;  her  art,  36- 
41,  44-46;  fetes  in  her  hon- 
or, 41,  43;  Sarah  the  work- 
er, 4,  42;  professor  at  the 
Conservatoire,  43 ;  ad- 
mitted to  Legion  of  Honor, 
43;  loses  her  leg,  47; 
repertoire,  12,  18,  28,  33 
(notes)  ;  160,  171,  175,  183, 
184  (note),  186-92,  199, 
201,  224,  226,  244. 

Berton,  Pierre,  133  (note), 
151. 

Bertrand,   Eugfcne,    151. 

Besnard,    Paul,    169. 

Betterton,  Mrs.,  iii. 

Bingham,  Amelia,  362 
(note). 

Black,   William,  248. 

Bloodgood,  Clara,  362 
(note). 

Botfnetain,    Paul,    34    (note). 

Booth,  Edwin,  77  and  note, 
208,  234,  240,  242,  247,  347. 

Boucicault,  Dion,  242. 


Bracegirdle,    Anne,    iii,    373, 

375  and  note. 
Brady,  William  A.,  359. 
Brand,  Thomas,  369. 
Brandes,   George,   87. 
Brougham,  John,   208. 
Browning,    Robert,    248. 
Burke,    Billie,    351. 
Burne-Jones,  Edward,  87. 
Byron,  Arthur,   205    (note). 
Byron,  Oliver  Doud,  205. 

Campbell,  Mrs.  Patrick,  366. 

Captain  Brassbound's  Con- 
version, 121-122. 

Carew,  James,   123    (note). 

Carter,  Mrs.  Leslie,  362 
(note). 

Carre",  Albert,   138. 

Caruso,  Enrico,   123. 

Cayvan,   Georgia,  .89    (note). 

Chanticler,  340. 

Charpentier,   Gustave,  41. 

Chartran,    T.,    169. 

Chartres,  Mme.  Vivanti,  194 
(note). 

Chaumont,    C6line,    160. 

Cheatham,  Kitty,   214. 

Checchi,   Signer,    175. 

Chetwood,  Wm.,   371    (note). 

Chilly,  M.,  11,  12. 

Chlapowski,  Count  Karol 
Bozenta,  67,  69,  72,  75,  76, 
79,  82-3  (note),  90  (note). 

Coghlan,  Charles,   109,  111. 

Coghlan,    Rose,    362    (note). 

Coleman,  Mrs.  Edw.,  370 
(note). 

Collins,  Wilkie,  248. 

Colombier,    Marie,    34. 

Come'die  Frangaise,  profit- 
sharing  system,  20  (note)  ; 
see  Bernhardt  and  R6jane. 

Conquest,  Ida,  362    (note). 

Cook,   Dutton,    96-7,   99. 

Copp€e,    Francois,   41,    42. 

Coquelin,  B.-C.,  23,  41,  193. 

Corbin,  John,  45,  314. 

Corey,  Mrs.,  370. 


INDEX 


385 


Cowl,  Jane,  362,  365. 
Crabtree,  Lotta,  228. 
Craig,  Ailsa,  106. 
Craig,  Gordon,  106,   121. 
Crehan,   Kate,  205   and  note. 
Crews,      Laura     Hope,      359, 

360-1. 

Crosman,  Henrietta,  362. 
Crosnier,  Mme.,  153. 
Cushman,   Charlotte,   iv,   235, 

239    (note),  347. 

Daly,  Arnold,  350. 

Daly,     Augustin,     207,     208, 

214-15    and    note,    219-20, 

222-27. 

Daly's  Theatre,  London,  223. 
Damala,  M.,  31. 
d'Annunzio,  Gabriel,  197,  276. 
d'Aurevilly,   B.,    150. 
D'Avenant,  William,  370  and 

note,    371. 

Davenport,  Mrs.,  370. 
Davenport,  E.  L.,  270. 
Davenport,   Fanny,   208. 
Davey,   Thomas,   267. 
David,   Felicien,   132. 
Davies,      Acton,      328,      336 

(note). 

Dean,   Frederic,  344    (note), 
de  Banville,  Theodore,   36. 
Defere,    M.,    150. 
de   Lesseps,   F.,  20    (note), 
de  Navarro,  Antonio  F.,  260. 
de  Reszke,   Eduard,   89. 
de  Reszke,  Jan,  89. 
de  Saint- Victor,  Paul,   17. 
Deschanel,    Paul,    49. 
Desctee,    Aim£e    Olympe,    137 

and  note,  222    (note). 
Devrient,   Fritz,   58. 
Dillingham,    C.    B.,    313. 
Doll's  House,  A,  280. 
Doran,  Dr.  John,  368. 
Dornis,  Jean,  174    (note). 
Doro,  Marie,   351. 
Doucet,  C.,  9   (note). 
Dow,    Ada     (Mrs.     Currier), 

301,  302  and  note,  306. 


Drew,  John,  206,  214,  226, 
332-4,  350. 

Drew,  Mrs.  John,  204  (note), 
206. 

Drew-Barrymore,  Georgie, 
350  (note). 

Dumas,  Alexandre,  fils,  175- 
7,  185,  188-9. 

Dumas,  Alexandre,  pere,  13 
(note) . 

Dunn,    Emma,   362,   365. 

Duquesnel,  M.,  11,  16,  142, 
143. 

Duse,  Eleonora,  iv,  123,  171- 
202;  birth,  171;  family, 
172;  childhood,  173-4; 
first  important  appear- 
ances, 174,  175;  marriage, 
175;  Duse  and  Dumas, 
176;  foreign  appearances, 
177-8;  acts  in  America, 
178,  183;  her  art,  179-81, 
199-202;  acts  in  London, 
183;  acts  in  Paris,  184-93; 
the  Dumas  memorial  per- 
formance, 188-9;  her  per- 
sonality, 194-6;  the  d'An- 
nuzio  alliance,  197;  her 
repertoire,  182  (note),  197 
(note)  j  265  (note). 

Eaton,  Walter  Prichard,  280, 

352,  355,  361. 

Eberle,   Robert,   344    (note). 
Echegaray,  Jose,  276. 
Edison,   Thomas  A.,  29. 
Elliott,   Gertrude,   366. 
Elliott,    Maxine,    362    (note). 
Emmet,  J.  K.,  270,  326. 
Easier,    Jane,    129. 
Eugenie,  former  Empress,  49. 

Faversham,      William,      336, 

350. 

Fen  wick,  Irene,  363,  365. 
Ferguson,    Elsie,    362,    364. 
Field,  Eugene,  87. 
Filon,     Augustin,     156     and 

note,   159. 


386 


INDEX 


Fiske,  Harrison  Grey,  269, 
289-90,  292. 

Fiske,  Mrs.  Minnie  Maddern, 
181  (note);  265-298; 
speaks  at  Harvard,  265; 
her  significance,  266 ; 
parentage,  267;  birth,  268; 
career  as  a  child-actress, 
268-7 1 ;  marriage  and  re- 
tirement, 272;  Mrs.  Fiske 
and  the  modern  spirit,  273; 
her  repertoire,  270  (note), 
274  (note)  ;  her  art,  275- 
87;  encouragement  of  na- 
tive-made drama,  288-9 ; 
Mr.  Fiske's  share,  289-90; 
the  theatrical  syndicate, 
290-1;  as  a  stage  director, 
291;  as  a  playwright,  292; 
outside  interests,  293 ;  her 
personality,  294-6;  357. 

Forbes,    Mary,    366. 

Forbes-Robertson,  J.,  255, 
376. 

Frohman,  Charles,  313,  331- 
2,  350. 

Frohman,  Daniel,  330. 

Fulda,   Ludwig,    276. 

Fyvie,  John,  373  and   (note). 

Garden,  Mary,  279. 
Gene"e,  Adeline,   123. 
George,    Grace,    359-60. 
Gilbert,  Mrs.  James,  214,  226. 
Gilbert,  W.  S.,  248,  255,  262. 
Gilder,  Richard  Watson,  87. 
Gillette,  William,  350. 
Gladstone,  Wm.  E.,  248. 
Glendinning,   Ernest,   350. 
Gosse,   Edmund,   248. 
Got,  Francois,  20,  27,  187. 
Grant,    General    U.    S.,    87, 

241. 
Griffin,    Dr.    Hamilton,    232, 

236,  237. 
Griffith,    Frank    Carlos,    269 

(note),    271     (note),    293 

(note),    295     (note),    296 

(note). 


Grille-d'Egout,   Mile.,    154. 
Gwynn,  Nell,   370. 

Hackett,  James  K.,  336,  350. 
Hale,  Philip,  49. 
Halfivy,  L.,   155,   187. 
Harancourt,   Edmond,   42. 
Hare,   John,    111,   376. 
Harned,    Virginia,    330,    362 

(note). 

Hedda    Gctiler,    279,    280. 
Hedman,    Martha,    356,    362, 

365. 

Herne,   James   A.,   327-8. 
Hichens,  Robert,  260. 
High  Road,    The,   289. 
Hill,  Barton,  80  and  note. 
Hollis    Street    Theatre,    Boar 

ton,  225    (note),  309. 
Hood,   General,  240. 
Howells,  William  Dean,  284, 

314    (note). 

Hughes,  Margaret,  370. 
Hugo,    Victor,    14    and   note, 

249. 

Huneker,  James,  357. 
Huret,  Jules,   7    (note),    128 

(note),  143,   153,  168,  169, 

192. 
Hyde,  James  Hazen,  165. 

Ibsen,    Henrik,    273,    276-7; 

279-81,    357. 

Illington,  Margaret,  362,  363. 
Ingersoll,    Robert   G.,    306-7, 

and  note. 

Irish  national  theatre,  103. 
Irving,     Henry,     105,     112-3, 

115,     117,     118,     120,     215 

(note),   247,  351,  376. 
Irving,      Isabel,      214,      362 

(note). 
Irwin,  May,   362    (note). 

James,  Henry,  21. 
Janaujschek,      Francesca,      v, 

347. 

Janis,  Elsie,  49    (note). 
Jefferson,   Joseph,   242,   270. 


INDEX 


387 


Johnson,   Samuel,  373-4  and 

note. 

Jones,  Henry  Arthur,  273. 
Jordan,  Dorothy,  iii. 
Jordan,     Thomas,     370,     371 

( note ) . 
Jourdain,  Frantz,  132. 

Kalich,  Bertha,  356,  366. 

Kean,   Charles,  95,  97,   101. 

Keane,  Doris,  362,  365. 

Keene,    Laura,   270. 

Kelly,   Charles;    see  Wardell. 

Kelm,  Joseph,  132. 

Kemble,     Frances     Ann,     iv, 

256. 

Kester,  Paul,  292. 
Killigrew,  Thomas,   370,  371. 
Kiskadden,    James,    325. 
Knipp,  Mrs.,  370. 

L'Aiglon,  337. 

Laurent,  Marie,   129. 

Lavedan,   Henri,  41. 

Leah  Kleschna,  287. 

Legault,   Mile.,    135. 

Legend  of  Leonora,  The,  343. 

Legouve",  Ernest,   136. 

Lemaitre,    Frederick,    129. 

Lemaitre,  Jules,  36,  41,  50, 
155,  187. 

Levick,  Milnes,  237. 

Lewis,   James,   214,   226. 

Little  Minister,  The,  334-5. 

Long,  John  Luther,  288,  298. 

Longfellow,  Henry  Wads- 
worth,  87-88,  242. 

Lowell,  James  Russell,  87, 
248,  249,  255. 

Lyceum  Theatre,  113-114. 

Lynch,  Arthur,  210,  218 
(note). 

Lytton,  Lord,  248. 

Macauley's  Theatre,  Louis- 
ville, 207. 

McCarthy,  Justin  H.,  87. 
McCarthy,    Lilian,    356,    366. 


McCracken,     Elizabeth,     321, 

323 
McCullough,  John,  79-80,  81 

(note),  208,  236,  247,  270. 
MacKaye,  Percy,  124  (note). 
McLellan,  C.  M.  S.  215 

(note),    288,   308. 
Macready,     William     C.,     98 

(note). 

McWade,  Robert,  301. 
Madame     Sans-G6ne,     155-6, 

158,    160,    162    and   note. 
Maeterlinck,  Maurice,  277. 
Magnus,   Baron,  27. 
Maid  of   Orleans,   The,   341. 
Manchester  Players,  The,  103. 
Man  of  Destiny,  The,  122. 


Mannering,         Mary, 


„         

(note). 

Mansfield,  Richard,  225 
(note). 

Mantell,   Robert,   350. 

Mapes,  Victor,   189    (note). 

Marlowe,  Julia,  89  (note), 
299-323;  birth,  299,  305 
(note);  girlhood,  300;  first 
appearances,  300;  course  of 
training,  302-4;  returns  ^to 
stage,  305;  early  uncertain- 
ties, 306-8;  first  triumph, 
309;  marriage  to  Robert 
Taber,  311;  repertoire,  311 
(note)  ;  the  Julia  Marlowe 
Taber  period,  311-3;  the 
period  of  the  commercial 
plays,  313-6;  the  "Sothern 
and  Marlowe"  period,  316- 
21;  acts  in  London,  318;  at 
the  New  Theatre,  319;  her 
personality,  321-3;  347. 

Marshall,  Anne,  370. 

Martin,  Frederick  Roy,  164. 

Mary  of  Magdala,  287. 

Matthison,  Edith  Wynne, 
356,  358-9. 

Maurice,  Paul,  15    (note). 

Maxwell,  Perriton,  330 
(notes). 

Mayer,  Gaston,  168    (note). 


388 


INDEX 


Meilhac,  Henri,  137,  153,  170. 

Mendes,  Catulle,  38  (note), 
42,  187. 

Mendes,  Catulle,  Mme.  Jane, 
47. 

Meunier,  Dauphin,  126,  140, 
154,  155. 

Hid-Channel,   352. 

Miles,  Robt.   E.  J.,  301,  305. 

Miller,  Henry,  350. 

Mitchell,    Langdon,    285. 

Modjeska,  Helena,  52-92 ; 
birth,  52;  childhood,  62- 
58;  marriage,  59;  first  ap- 
pearance, 60;  life  as  a 
strolling  player,  61;  joins 
company  at  Lemberg,  63; 
in  stock  company  at  Czer- 
niowce,  63;  in  company  of 
Cracow  theatre,  64-69 ; 
goes  to  Imperial  Theatre  at 
Warsaw,  70;  goes  to  Amer- 
ica, 76;  the  farming  ex- 
periment in  California,  78; 
first  appearance  in  Ameri- 
ca, 81;  repertoire,  82 
(note)  ;  her  personality, 
83;  her  art  85-87;  her 
friendships,  87;  her  ad- 
dress at  the  Chicago  Ex- 
position, 89 ;  testimonial  of 
1905,  90;  death,  92;  347. 

Modrzejewski,  Gustave,  56, 
57,  59,  61,  64. 

Mohun,  Lord,  373. 

Morris,  Clara-,  89  (note), 
242,  362  (note). 

Mountford,   William,   373. 


Naptal-Arnault,     Mme.,     128 

(note). 

Nazimova,   Alia,   356-8. 
Neilson,     Adelaide,    -v,     208, 

219. 

Neilson,   Julia,   94    (note). 
Neilson-Terry,      Phyllis,      94 

(note),  366. 
Newman,  Cardinal,  248. 


New  Theatre,  The,  124 
(note),  316,  319,  359. 

New  York  Idea,  The,  283-284 
(note). 

Noirmont,   Mme.,   35. 

Offenbach,  J.,  145. 
Oldfield,  Anne,  iii. 
Olivia,   111-2. 
O'Neil,  Nance,  358,   362. 
O'Neill,   James,   292. 
Orleneff,   Paul,    356. 
Owen,   William,   308. 

Paderewski,     Ignace    J.,     88, 

90,  91    (note). 
Page,  Adele,  129. 
Parker,  H.  T.,  279,  280. 
Parker,    Louis    N.,    334. 
Peabody,    Josephine    Preston, 

124   (note). 

Pepys,   Samuel,   370,    371. 
Perrin,  Emile,  17,  19,  22,  24, 

27. 

Peter  Pan,  338-9. 
Pillars  of  Society,  279,  282. 
Pinero,  A.  W.,  273,  276,  376. 
Poincaire",   Raymond,   43. 
Porel,  D.-P.,  152,  166. 
Power,   Tyrone,   286,   287. 
Prince    of    Wales's    Theatre, 

109. 

Princess's  Theatre,  95. 
Provost,  Jean,  9    (note). 
Prynne,  William,  369. 

Rachel  (Rachel  Felix),  iv, 
45  (note),  150. 

Raymond,  John  T.,  208. 

Reade,  Charles,  104,  108,  116. 

Reed,  Florence,  363,  365. 

Regnier,  F.-J.,  9  (note),  133, 
134,  135  and  note,  136,  138, 
140,  144,  145-9,  150,  151, 
161. 

Rehan,  Ada,  iii,  203-229; 
birth,  204;  bought  to 
America,  204;  her  family, 
205;  first  appearance,  205; 


INDEX 


389 


in  various  companies,  206- 
209;  joins  Augustin  Daly, 
209;  her  repertoire,  208 
(note),  217  (note);  her 
personality,  210-13;  the 
Daly  Company,  214;  her 
acting,  217-21,  226;  first 
plays  in  London,  221;  be- 
comes a  "star,"  224;  her 
last  appearances,  227-8 ; 
347. 

Reicher,  Hedwig,  356,  366. 
ReMane,  Gabrielle,  126-170; 
birth,  128;  childhood,  128- 
131;  at  school,  131-133; 
enters  the  Conservatoire, 
133 ;  first  public  appearance, 
138;  joins  the  Vaudeville, 
142 ;  repertoire,  143-4 
(note) ;  correspondence  with 
Regnier,  145-9 ;  informal 
appearances,  150;  joins  the 
Varies,  151;  a  typical 
first  night,  152;  Madame 
Sans-Gene,  155;  her  per- 
sonality, 126,  156,  168-70; 
her  art,  158-160;  appear- 
ances outside  France,  160- 
1,  167;  the  American 
tours,  161;  the  Havana  fi- 
asco, 163-4;  the  Hyde  din- 
ner, 165;  marriage,  166; 
the  Theatre  Re  jane,  166-7 ; 
291. 

Richepin,  Jean,  34  (note),  35. 
Richman,  Charles,  228. 
Riley,  Josephine,   301. 
Ristori,     Adelaide,     iv,     200, 

244. 

Robinson,  Mary,  iv. 
Robson,  Eleanor,  362    (note). 
Rochefort,  Henri,  187. 
Rosemary,  334. 
Rosmersholm,   281. 
Rossi,  Cesare,   175. 
Rostand,      Edmond,      3,      4 
(note),  41,  42,  43,  49,  189. 
Ruhl,  Arthur,  357. 
Russell,  Annie,  362. 


Russell,       Hattie        (Harriet 
Crehan),  205  (note). 

Salvation   Nell,   279,  288. 
Salvini,  Tommaso,  183,  200. 
Samson,  Joseph,  9   (note). 
Sand,  George,   13. 
Sarcey,         Francisque, 

(note),  15,  17,  25,  36,  137, 

140,  144,  150,  154,  155,  177, 

187,  190,  192. 
Sardou,  Victorien,  25   (note), 

41,  150,  155,  162,  223. 
Saunderson,  Mrs.,  370. 
Scott,  Clement,  94,  106,  111, 

112,   114,  221,  222    (note). 
Scott,  Sir  Walter,  93. 
Sembrich,        Marcella,         91 

(note). 

Shannon,  EfiSe,   362    (note). 
Shaw,    George    Bernard,    iii, 

38,    113-4,    115,    117,    120, 

121,   199,  225-7,  273. 
Shaw,  Mary,  308,  362  (note). 
Sheldon,  Edward,  288. 
Sherman,  General  Wm.  T.,  87, 

241. 

Siddons,  Sarah,  iv,   374. 
Sienkiewicz,  Henryk,   75,   81. 
Simon,   Charles,    133. 
Skinner,  Otis,  226,  227,  350. 
Sothern,  E.  A.,  103,   118. 
Sothern,  E.  H.,  265,  316-20, 

330,  350. 
Stahl,  Rose,  362. 
Starr,  Frances,  362,  365. 
Stedman,  E.  C.,  91,  92. 
Stevens,  Emily,  362,  364. 
Stinson,   Fred,   308,   312. 
Stoddard,    Lorimer,   284. 
Sudermann,   Hermann,   276. 
Symons,     Arthur,     159,     194, 

318. 
Synge,   John  M.,  iii. 

Taber,     Robert,     308,     311-2, 

313   (note). 
Tarasiewicz,  Michael,  92. 


390 


INDEX 


Taylor,  Laurette,  362,  366. 

Tellegen,   Lou,  350. 

Tempest,  Marie,  366. 

Tennyson,  Lord,  87,  223,  248, 
256. 

Terry,  Beatrice,  94    (note). 

Terry,  Benjamin,  93,  94,  95, 
96. 

Terry,  Charles,  94  and  note. 

Terry,  Ellen,  iii,  93-125 ; 
parentage,  93 ;  family,  94- 
6;  birth,  94;  early  train- 
ing, 96,  99-100;  first  ap- 
pearance, 96-8;  a  strolling 
player.  101;  Atar-Gull, 
102;  at  Bristol,  102-3; 
with  the  elder  Sothern, 
103;  marriage  and  retire- 
ment, 103-4;  returns  to 
stage,  104;  acts  first  with 
Irving,  105;  second  retire- 
ment, 106-8;  returns  to 
stage,  109;  with  S.  B.  Ban- 
croft, 109-11;  first  plays 
Portia,  109;  with  John 
Hare,  111-12;  Olivia,  111; 
becomes  leading  woman  at 
the  Lyceum,  112;  the  Irv- 
ing regime,  113;  her  per- 
sonality, 114,  118,  121; 
Bernard  Shaw's  estimate, 
113,  115,  117,  120;  her  art, 
116;  leaves  Irving's  com- 
pany, 121;  the  Terry  Jubi- 
lee, 122;  a  lecturer  on 
Shakespeare,  123-4;  reper- 
toire, 119  (note)  ;  247. 

Terry,    Florence,    94,    95. 

Terry,  Fred,  94  and  note. 

Terry,  George,  94    (note). 

Terry,  Kate,  94,  95,  101,  102. 

Terry,  Marion,  94,  95. 

Terry,  Minnie,  94    (note). 

Tess  of  the  D'UrbervUles, 
284. 

Theuriet,  Andre",  41,  42. 


Thierry,  Edward,    135. 
Thomas,  Ambroise,   136. 
Thompson,    Vance,    157. 
Tilden,       Samuel       J.,       244 

(note) . 
Tree,  H.  Beerbohm,  318,  376. 

Vandenhoff,  George,  236. 
Varrey,  Charles,  20   (note). 
Verbruggen,  Mrs.,  iii. 
Victoria,  Queen,  of  Spain,  49. 
von  Billow,  Hans,  87. 

Walkley,  A.  B.,  318,  319 
(note). 

Wallack,  Lester,  355. 

Walsh,  Blanche,  362    (note). 

Ward,  Mrs.  Humphrey,  248. 

Wardell,  Charles,  106,  123 
(note). 

Ware,  Helen,  362,  365. 

Warfield,  David,  350. 

Watterson,  Henry,  87,  232 
(note),  238  (note),  244 
(note). 

Watts,  George  Frederick,  87, 
103-4,  248. 

Western,  Lucille,  270. 

White,  Le  Grand,  272   (note). 

Wilde,    Oscar,    157,    273. 

Wills,  W.  G.,  112. 

Wilson,  Francis,  265. 

Winter,  William,  3,  26,  35, 
37,  38,  44,  46,  85,  90 
(note),  123,  165,  211,  212, 
220  and  note,  228,  238 
(note),  242,  247,  251,  261, 
313  (note),  315,  335,  338 
and  note,  340,  347. 

Woffington,  Margaret,  iii. 

Worthing,  Frank,  360. 

Wyndham,   Charles,   376. 

Young,  Mary,  214   (note). 
Zimmern,  Helen,  196    (note). 


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